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THE KING, THE KAISER 
AND IRISH FREEDOM 







JAMES K. McGUIRE 



THE KING, THE KAISER 
AND IRISH FREEDOM 



BY 
JAMES K. McGUIRE 




NEW YORK 

THE DEVIN- ADAIR COMPANY 

437 FIFTH AVENUE 






^^^ 



COPTRIOHT, 1915, BY 

THE DEVIN- ADAIR COMPANY 



MAR ihi9(5 
^CI,A397060 



This Book Is Dedicated 

to the millions of men and women of German blood 
in this country — who form the bulwarks of American 
civilization — to Johannes DeKalb and Steuben, the 
heroic and efficient soldiers and advisers of George 
Washington — to the memory of Germans who fought 
with Andrew Jackson against England in the War of 
1812 — to the German- American heroes of 1848 — to 
the great numbers of Germans who fought for the 
freedom of men and the preservation of the American 
Union in the Civil War from 1861 to the year 1865 — 
to their children in the Spanish-American War of 
1898 — to all the vast Teutonic elements of the United 
States whose efforts have placed our nation to the 
forefront in education and in all arts and sciences — 
a noble people from whom Americans learn to be effi- 
cient and thorough — to the thrifty, useful, industri- 
ous, patriotic children of the Fatherland. 

James K. McGuire. 
New York, March 4, 1915, the anniversary of Robert Emmet. 



[5] 



PREFACE 

This book is made necessary by the studied viola- 
tions of neutrality on the part of certain Anglo-Amer- 
ican newspapers, by the misrepresentation of the true 
spirit of Irish nationality at home and abroad, by the 
vilification of Germany, the infamous distortion of 
the truth by various writers and, above all, by the 
growing probability that this section of unfair Amer- 
ica, by no means in a majority, will destroy all hope 
of the United States becoming the arbiter at the end 
of the European war. The German people must un- 
derstand that the Anglo-American newspaper is with- 
out real influence among the people and that in this 
war it does not represent the true state of public opin- 
ion. 

The Cologne Gazette, perhaps one of the most im- 
portant newspapers in Germany, declares that the atro- 
cious falsehoods of the American press render impos- 
sible all hope of American intervention for peace and 
destroys all possibility of America having part in the 
settlement after the war, thus relegating our country 
to a most inferior position. We are regarded as a 
vassal of England and have lost our influence as a 
neutral state. Bishop Von Keppler, of Bavaria, the 
most eminent Catholic prelate of Germany, is quoted 

[71 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

as confirming the view of the Cologne Gasefte, which 
adds: 

"American neutrality has been favorable to Great 
Britain, and America has lost our confidence and must 
be rejected as an arbitrator." 

James K. McGuire. 
New York, March, 1915. 



[8] 



ENDORSEMENT 

James K. McGuire is peculiarly fitted and especially 
endowed to write a book friendly to Germany. The 
first education he received in Syracuse was in a Ger- 
man school and his next schooling took place in the 
German school then in the basement of the Lutheran 
church in Butternut Street, Syracuse, New York. It 
is thirteen years since Mr. McGuire left Syracuse. 
During the thirty years he lived in our midst, no man 
occupied a warmer place in the hearts and affections 
of the German people. Long time Mayor of Syra- 
cuse, he always held the support of the German peo- 
ple, irrespective of party ties. It is perfectly natural 
for him to defend German ideals and causes, for he is 
a student and writer on German history, philosophy 
and poetry, as well as a firm friend and son of Ire- 
land with an international reputation. 

(Signed) Alex. E. Oberlander. 
Editor and Publisher of the Deutche Union, 

Syracuse, New York, 



[9] 



CONTENTS 

CHAPTER PACE 

I. Sir Roger Casement's Mission to Ger- 
many 15 

II. Emperor William of Germany . . 29 

III. England Lengthening the American 

Bread Line 33 

IV. Alsace 46 

V. Germans in the United States . . 51 

VI. Why England W^ill Never Grant 

Freedom to Ireland 58 

VII. What Germany Could Do for Ire- 
land 68 

VIII. How England Destroyed Irish In- 
dustries 78 

IX. Ireland's Commerce ..... 82 

X. English Atrocities in Ireland . . 97 

XL The Irish Home Rule Bill . . .111 

XII. Our Interference in Ireland . . 126 

XIII. English Society Tempts Irish 

Leaders ........ 135 

XIV. Fomenting Religious Prejudices . 145 

XV. Recruiting the Irish National Vol- 
unteers 156 

[II] 



CONTENTS 



XVI. 

XVII. 

XVIII. 

XIX. 
XX. 

XXI. 

XXII. 
XXIII. 
XXIV. 

XXV. 

XXVI. 



The Women of Ireland . 

Leaders of Ireland . 

Young Ireland of 1848 . 

The Uprising of 1865 . 

The Situation in Ireland 

How England Serves Up the News 
for the World . 



New York Public Opinion 
Irish Opinion in South America 
Irish Feeling Favors Germany 
A Word for Austria-Hungary 

Conclusion 

Postscript 



PAGE 
177 

198 

219 
230 
240 

271 

275 
287 



[12] 



ILLUSTRATIONS 
James K. McGuire Frontispiece 

FACING 
PAGB 

Emperor William of Germany 29 

Robert Emmet 58 

Sarah CuRRAN 172 

Theobold Wolfe Tone 177 

Daniel O'Connell 183 

John Mitchel 197 

Michael Davitt 254 

Charles Stewart Parnell ...... 270 



[13] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND 
IRISH FREEDOM 



CHAPTER I 

SIR ROGER casement's MISSION TO GERMANY 

The visit of Sir Roger Casement to the German 
foreign office at Berlin last November created 
considerable interest in America and no little con- 
sternation in England. Sir Roger Casement rep 
resented the real Nationalists in his visit and was 
selected by them as ambassador because he was 
known as a tried friend of the movement for the 
independence of Ireland. 

The first newspaper to announce the result of 
his mission was the official organ of the German 
foreign office, the Norddeutsche Allgemeine 
Zeitung, which, on November 20, 1914, made the 
following announcement : 

The well-known Irish Nationalist, Sir Roger Case- 
ment, who recently arrived in Berlin from the United 
States, was received at the Foreign Office. Sir Roger 
Casement pointed out that there had been circulated in 
Ireland statements, apparently authorized by the Brit- 
ish Government, to the effect that a German victory 
would inflict great injury upon the Irish people. Their 

[15] 



■^ 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

land, their habitations, their churches, and their priests 
would be handed over to the tender mercies of an army 
of invaders, whose only motives were plunder and con- 
quest. Recent assertions of Mr. Redmond on the occa- 
sion of his recruiting tour through Ireland, as well as 
manifold editorial statement of the British press in 
Ireland, had, so Sir Roger explained, been widely cir- 
culated, and had naturally occasioned among the Irish 
fears respecting the attitude of Germany toward Ire- 
land. In the event of a German victory. Sir Roger 
asked for a convincing declaration about Germany's 
intentions toward Ireland, such as might restore the 
equanimity of his fellow-countrymen throughout the 
world, but especially in Ireland and America, in view 
of the disturbing statements circulated from respon- 
sible British quarters. The Acting Secretary of State 
for Foreign Affairs thereupon made the following offi- 
cial statement on behalf of the Imperial Chancellor : 

"The Imperial Government rejects with the utmost 
decision the evil intentions ascribed to it in the asser- 
tions quoted by Sir Roger Casement. The govern- 
ment takes this opportunity of making the categorical 
assurance that Germany cherishes only sentiments of 
good will for the prosperity of the Irish people, their 
land, and their institutions. The Imperial Govern- 
ment declares formally that Germany would not invade 
Ireland with any intentions of conquest or of the de- 
struction of any institutions. If, in the course of this 
r war, which Germany did not seek, the fortune of arms 
"(^^ should ever bring German troops to the coasts of Ire- 

[i6] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

land, they would land there, not as an army of invad- 
ers coming to rob or destroy, but as the fighting forces 
of a government inspired only by good will toward a 
land and a people for whom Germany only wishes na- 
tional prosperity and national freedom." 

The above statement was officially confirmed 
by the German Chancellor at Berlin, the German 
Foreign Office, and it was sent out officially by 
wireless from Berlin to London and America, via 
wireless to Sayville, Long Island, which is the only 
means of direct communication between Germany 
and the United States, since England cut the 
cables. Of course, very little news of this im- 
portant declaration reached the country so seri- 
ously affected by it — deceived Ireland. Since the 
declaration of war by England against Germany, 
the Irish have been daily frightened into the be- 
lief that a German invasion would mean wreak- 
ing frightful atrocities on helpless women and 
children, the destruction of their homes and 
properties, and such cruelties as, they were fooled 
into believing, occurred hourly in Belgium. The 
bogies and the conjuring of the "German acts 
of barbarism" by Redmond, Devlin and O'Con- 
nor were the principal bits of stage property they 
had been using to secure recruits for the British 
\ [17] 



'*!?^ 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

army. To lose this precious and essential bit of 
scenery would destroy the great act in the recruit- 
ing drama. In America the declaration ended 
the last hopes of Redmond's following, the rem- 
nants of the United Irish League vanished into 
thin air, the proposed meetings were called off 
and a feeling of solidarity among Irish National- 
ists was created. Redmond stood aghast over 
this news, which, despite press censors, was filter- 
ing through, penetrating parts of Ireland and in- 
terfering with the recruiting programme. A few 
days of silence passed, when the London cables 
informed the Anglo-American press that poor 
Casement was insane and had been suffering 
from ill health, that he had been long a loyal son 
of Great Britain and was deserving of the great- 
est pity for his derangement. Observing Ameri- 
cans replied that while, possibly, Sir Roger 
Casement might have, according to English re- 
ports, a few "bats in his belfry," that there was 
no question about the brainy headpiece of the 
/ German Government and that ''national freedom" 
for Ireland, with the aid of Germany, was no 
evidence of brainstorm. The evident plight of 
the English Government was pitiful while the 
real Irish Nationalists rejoiced. 

[i8] 



*v 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

The writer has been at some pains in investi- 
gating the record of Sir Roger Casement. His 
career is one of which any man might well feel 
proud. He is fifty years of age, born in County 
Antrim, near Belfast, an Ulster Protestant and 
a staunch friend and supporter of Irish inde- 
pendence. He has held important positions in the 
British foreign service without a blemish on his 
private or official record. 

In 1895 he was British Consul; for West Africa 
and Consul to the Congo Free State, which posi- 
tion he occupied for eleven years. He was sent 
to Brazil in 1906, declined the consul general- 
ship of the West Indies in 1907 and was made 
consul general for Brazil in 1909. 

His diplomatic ability and commercial speciali- 
zation are of the highest order and he would have 
been elevated to the chief diplomatic posts but 
for his well-known view that his own country, 
Ireland, could only work out her destiny by sep- 
aration from England. This was the same view 
held by the rebel of 1848, Sir Charles Gavan 
Duffy, who rose to the position of Premier of 
Australia and who, to the day of his death, hoped 
to see the green flag flying over a free Ireland. 
Six weeks after the war broke out, Sir Roger 

[19] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

Casement sent this letter to the Irish newspapers : 

Let Irishmen and boys stay in Ireland. Their duty 
is clear — before God and before man. We, as a peo- 
ple, have no quarrel with the German people. Ger- 
many has never wronged Ireland, and we owe her 
more than one debt of gratitude. It was not a Ger- 
man steamship company that, last summer, with the 
assent of the government making the contract, broke 
public faith with the Irish people and abandoned its 
pledged service with the port of Cork. But it was a 
German steamship company that tried to make good 
the breach of public trust and the injury to Irish trade 
that the Cunard Company had committed, and the 
British Postmaster-General, Admiralty, and Board of 
Trade had connived at. And it was another British 
department that made representation at Berlin, in be- 
half of English trade jealousy, and caused the German 
Emperor to intervene to induce the Hamburg-Ameri- 
can line to substitute Southampton for Queenstown — 
a British for an Irish port. The hated German was 
welcome when he came to an English port — his help 
and enterprise were out of place when directed to as- 
sisting Irishmen to better means of intercourse with 
the outside world. 

Sir Roger Casement is an Irishman of the pur- 
est patriotic gold. We take no pride in the con- 
stant allusions by England to her great military 
and naval commanders who are born in Ireland. 

[20] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

They are Tories and are opposed to the freedom 
of their own coun.try. No patriotic Irishman re- 
joices in Lord Kitchener, Lord Roberts, Rear 
Admiral Callaghan or in the military genius of 
the Duke of Wellington. These men fought for 
England alone and never for Ireland. They 
were given their reward by England and no 
shrine is visited in Ireland which venerates their 
names. In bitterness of feeling toward National- 
ist Ireland, these Irish saviours of England have 
outdone the descendants of Cromwell. It is not 
so with the able Irishman whose name heads this 
chapter, Roger Casement. 

PROPHETIC 

Extracts from the writings of Sir Roger Case- 
ment and written before the war: 

Without Ireland there would be to-day no British 
Empire. The vital importance of Ireland to England 
is understood, but never proclaimed by any British 
statesman. To subdue that western and ocean-closing 
island and to exploit its resources, its people and, 
above all, its position, to the sole advantage of the 
eastern island, has been the set aim of every English 
government from the days of Henry VIII onwards. 

* * * ♦ >K 

Napoleon, too late in St. Helena, realized his error : 

[21] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

"Had I gone to Ireland instead of to Egypt the empire 
of England was at an end." 

The power of the British fleet can never be perma- 
nently restrained until Ireland is restored to Europe. 
Germany has of necessity become the champion of 
European interests as opposed to the world dominion 
\ of England and English-speaking elements. She is to- 
j day a dam, a great reservoir rapidly filling with human 
life that must some day find an outlet. England in- 
stead of wisely digging channels for the overflow has 
hardened her heart, like Pharaoh, and thinks to pre- 
vent it or to so divert the stream that it shall be lost 
and drunk up in the thirsty sands of an ever expand- 
ing Anglo-Saxondom. German laws, German lan- 
guage, German civilization, are to find no ground for 
replenishing, no soil to fertilize and make rich. 

^ England relies on money. Germany on men. And 
just as Roman men beat Carthaginian mercenaries, so 

i must German manhood, in the end, triumph over Brit- 
[ ish finance. Just as Carthage in the hours of final 
shock, placing her gold where Romans put their gods, 
and never with a soul above her ships, fell before the 
people of United Italy, so shall the mightier Carthage 
of the North Seas, in spite of trade, shipping, colonies, 
the power of the purse and the hired valor of the 

f' foreign (Irish, Indian, African), go down before the 

\ men of United Germany. 

3|C ^ I* 1» ^ 

[22] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

In order to make sure the encompassing of Europe 
with a girdle of steel it is necessary to circle the 
United States with a girdle of Hes. With America 
true to the policy of her great founder, an America 
"the friend of all Powers but the ally of none," Eng- 
lish designs against European civilization must in 
the end fall. Those plans can succeed only by 
active American support, and to secure this is now 
the supreme task and aim of British stealth and 
skill. Every tool of her diplomacy, polished and un- 
polished, from the trained envoy to the boy scout and 
the minor poet, has been tried in turn. The pulpit, 
the bar, the press, the society hostess, the Cabinet 
Minister and the Cabinet Minister's wife, the ex- 
Cabinet Minister and the royal family itself, and last, 
but not least, even "Irish Nationality" — all have been 
pilgrims to that shrine, and each has been carefully 
primed, loaded, well-aimed, and then turned full on 
the weak spots in the armor of republican simplicity. 
To the success of these resources of panic the falsifica- 
tion of history becomes essential and the vilification 
of the most peace-loving people of Europe. The past 
relations of England with the United States are to be 
blotted out, and the American people, who are by blood 
so largely Germanic, are to be entrapped into an atti- 
tude of suspicion, hostility, and resentment against the 
country and race from whom they have received noth- 
ing but good. Germany is represented as the enemy, 
not to England's indefensible claim to own the seas, 
but to American ideals on the American Continent. 

[23] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

Just as the Teuton has become the "Enemy of Civiliza- 
tion" in the Old World because he alone has power, 
strength of mind, and force of purpose to seriously 
dispute the British h*^gemony of the seas, so he is as- 
siduously represented as the only threat to American 
hegemony of the New World. 

The birds of the forest are on the wing. 

It is an empire in these straits that turns to Amer- 
ica, through Ireland, to save it. And the price it of- 
fers is — war with Germany. France may serve for 
a time; but France, like Germany, is in Europe, and 
in the end it is all Europe and not only Germany Eng- 
land assails. Permanent confinement of the white 
races, as distinct from the Anglo-Saxon variety, can 
only be achieved by the active support and close al- 
liance of the American people. These people are to- 
day, unhappily, republicans and freemen, and have no 
ill-will for Germany and a positive distaste for im- 
perialism. It is not really in their blood. That blood 
is mainly Irish and German, the blood of men not 
distinguished in the past for successful piracy and 
addicted rather to the ways of peace. The wars that 
Germany has waged have been wars of defence, or 
wars to accomplish the unity of her people. Irish 
wars have been only against one enemy, and ending 
always in material disaster, they have conferred always 
a moral gain. Their memory uplifts the Irish heart; 
for no nation, no people, can reproach Ireland with 
having wronged them. She has injured no man. 

[24l 



THE KING. THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

And now, to-day, it is the great free race of this 
common origin of peace-loving peoples, filling another 
continent, that is being appealed to by every agency 
of crafty diplomacy, in every garb but that of truth, 
to aid the enemy of both and the arch-disturber of 
the Old World. The jailer of Ireland seeks Irish- 
American support to keep Ireland in prison; the in- 
triguer against Germany vi^ould win German-Ameri- 
can good-will against its parent stock. There can be 
no peace for mankind, no limit to the intrigues set 
on foot to assure Great Britain "the mastery of the 
seas." 

BRITISH PLOT TO MURDER SIR ROGER CASEMENT 

FAILS 

Sir Roger Casement expected to leave Berlin 
in February, 1915, for Christiania, Norway, to lay 
the proofs before the Norwegian Government of 
a conspiracy to capture and return him to Eng- 
land or kill him, the chief conspirator being Mans- 
field DeC. Findlay, the British Minister to Nor- 
way, who endeavored to bribe a servant in the 
employ of Sir Roger, one Adler A. Christenson, 
a Norwegian, who was to receive at least $25,000 
as a reward for his treachery and betrayal of his 
master, if successful. Sir Roger Casement has 
shown copies of the correspondence exposing the 
conspiracy to the German Foreign Office and 

[25] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

photographic copies are being sent by Sir Roger 
to his friends on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean. 
He is regarded by the British Government in ex- 
actly the same light as Robert Emmet and other 
patriots who were swung to their death from Brit- 
ish scaffolds. If captured and brought to Eng- 
land, this patriotic Irishman will be charged with 
high treason to the Crown and executed. Fearing 
that the difficulties of capturing him could not be 
surmounted, the British Minister to Norway in- 
structed Christenson to lure Sir Roger Casement 
to a point on the coast, where a British ship could 
run in and get him, "or, still better, knock him 
on the head." Announcement is officially made 
from the Berlin Foreign Office that the discovery 
of the conspiracy has been submitted to the 
American Ambassador and that copies will be 
sent to Secretary of State Bryan, at Washington. 
England must get rid of Casement at any cost, 
for he represents the true spirit of Irish nation- 
ality, which is the faith and hope of the sons and 
daughters of the Celts and the Gaels throughout 
the world. 

The English spy system has been developed to 
an extraordinary degree. There are few pages 
of Irish history free from the sinister story of 

[26] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

the spy and the informer. Where the system of 
paid spies fails, the lure of British gold to bribe 
the servants of illustrious Irishmen to betray 
their masters is a common occurrence in the his- 
tory of the British Empire. The servant of Sir 
Roger Casement proved incorruptible, otherwise 
another Irish patriot would have been destroyed. 



[27] 



UNANSWERABLE 

If the Kaiser wanted to break the peace of the world, 
why should he have waited until his country was 
ringed round with hostile alliances? If he wanted war 
with his present opponents, why did he refrain from 
urging war on England when the English armies were 
engaged in sanguinary combat with the Boer Republic 
or with the Russians during their life and death strug- 
gle with the Japanese hosts ? Is he not the only great 
ruler in the world who kept his country at peace from 
the beginning of his reign and for more than a quar- 
ter of a century? 



[28] 




EMPEROR WlLLlAAi UE GERMANY 

"Sie haben mir das Schwert in die Hand gedriickt ; ich 
kann nicht anders." 

"They have forced the sword into my hand. I cannot do 
otherwise." 



CHAPTER II 

EMPEROR WILLIAM OF GERMANY 

'*Sie haben mir das Schwert in die Hand 
gedriickt: ich kann nicht anders." ("They have 
forced the sword into my hand. I cannot do 
otherwise.") 

These were the words from the lips of the 
Kaiser as the command went forth to the German 
people to defend the Fatherland against the na- 
tions who had hemmed them in. The patriotic 
reply was unanimous and instantaneous. No such 
evidence of the solidarity of a great nation, faced 
by a common danger, is furnished by the world's 
history. The dulled legions of Russia responded 
slowly while revolutions burst forth throughout 
the vast Russian Empire. England declared war 
on Germany with her cabinet split in twain, the 
war denounced in Parliament, followed by sedi- 
tion in Ireland, protests in Canada, armed rebel- 
lion in the Transvaal and Orange State, mutinies 
in India and revolution in Egypt. The govern- 
ment of Portugal is still in a state of disorder oyer 

[29] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

its entrance to the war theatre. The divisions in 
Turkey are apparent. 

In Germany the people are united. All party 
lines have fallen — to be rebuilt after the war 
along new alignments, but nozv the motto is "One 
for all — all for one." While the whole world, 
with mixed feelings and bated breath, watches 
its most interesting figure — the Kaiser. They 
contrast that strong figure and resolute face with 
the weak apparitions and mediaeval figures of 
King George and the Czar of the Russias, and 
they find in the Emperor the very embodiment of 
the German progress and efficiency which earned 
the hate and jealousy of the mistress of the seas. 
All of the numerous German political divisions 
have been unified in support of the Kaiser — the 
great Socialist party, the Catholic party (the 
centre), the Conservatives, Poles, National Lib- 
erals and Progressives. 

The private life and domestic virtues of 
William of Germany typify in their practice the 
dominant and indestructible features of all that 
is best in the German character. He is one of 
the few kings in the history of the world untainted 
by scandal or weakened by vice. His afifection 
for his family, his devotion to his friends, his 

[30] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

abstemious habits, the Spartan simplicity of his 
personal living, are admired by all observers. He 
rises at five in the morning, works many hours 
of the day and night and is Emperor in fact as 
well as in name. His motto is, "Rest means 
rust." He finds time for simple amusements, out- 
door exercise, and visitors find him one of the 
freshest and most alert men in Europe. No one 
more than he realizes that the German problem is 
economic, and therefore he studies all important 
works of political economy and is the keenest stu- 
dent on a throne of the progress of governments. 
He went to war, as he believed, to save the future 
of Germany. Mr. Andrew Carnegie said, "The 
Emperor was the most sorrowful man in the 
world when he realized that war could not be 
averted." 

For three centuries religious differences had 
created a sharp cleavage in the German states. 
Fierce and prolonged wars had been fought be- 
tween sects of Christians. Under the reign of 
the present ruler, Protestants, Catholics and Jews 
live together in the greatest harmony. The broad 
spirit and tolerance of the Emperor, his catholic 
view of all worshippers or non-believers, are con- 
trasted with the religious persecutions sponsored 

[31] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

by the Czar of Russia and the French Govern- 
ment. The latter drives the nuns from France 
during the same period that the Jews are being 
persecuted and murdered in Russia. The King 
of England refuses to permit his army to enforce 
the terms of a Home Rule Bill, thrice voted by 
Parliament, lest the law be followed by armed 
rebellion in the name of religion. Under Em- 
peror William, for twenty-six years Germany has 
known religious peace. 



[32] 



CHAPTER III 

ENGLAND LENGTHENING THE AMERICAN BREAD 
LINE 

Sympathy for the Belgians is general in Amer- 
ica and England has taken every advantage of 
that feeling to hide her tracks in the work of de- 
stroying American commerce on the high seas. 
The average American citizen is a curious com- 
bination of the Yankee trader and the senti- 
mentalist. More than any other nation, we are 
carried off our feet by great gusts of sympathy 
for a stricken people. This was the case with the 
downfall of Poland, of Hungary, and of Ireland. 
Only two foreigners that the writer recalls have 
been permitted to address the Congress of the 
United States. One was Kossuth, the Hungarian 
patriot; the second, Charles Stewart Parnell, the 
Irish leader. 

But we soon forget our sympathy and reaction 
sets in when the principal American nerves, the 
pocket nerves, ache and throb too long. He is 
blind indeed who fails to see that the German 
cause has greatly advanced in the month of Jan- 

[33] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

uary, 1915, in all sections of the United States. 
Not only is Thought gradually working itself 
clear, but the American who wants to be fair is 
beginning to warm toward the side where 100,- 
000,000 people struggle against 700,000,000, and 
with the products of the rest of the world aiding 
this huge majority and neutral countries work- 
ing overtime supplying the allies alone with arma- 
ment and war supplies. Overtopping all, the 
American is commencing to realize that canny 
England, not Germany, is depriving the United 
States of her commerce. Never does a German 
man-of-war seize an American ship for contra- 
band. All of these outrages have been per- 
petrated by the ruler of the seas. At last Uncle 
Sam is awake and is questioning England, as he 
questioned her in 1861, and the average citizen 
is sitting up and taking notice of the answer. 

The cotton planters down South last year, who 
sold Germany 2,350,000 bales of cotton, are for- 
getting some of Belgium's horrors in their own 
woes as they realize that the British embargo 
cut off the German and Austrian market, drove 
cotton down to famine prices, enabled the shrewd 
English cotton mill buyers to get cotton at a 
frightful loss to the American planter and at a 

[34] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

huge profit to the English buyer. Your cotton 
planter is writing letters by the thousands now 
telling how the English worked the most success- 
ful trade trick known to man and, after making 
the planter practically give away his cotton, then 
lifted it from the contraband list so that Ger- 
many and Austria would pay more. But all 
at the expense of the cotton growers of the 
South. The sunburnt man under the soft wool 
hat in Dixie is digging up his school histories 
these days to remind his neighbors of Marion the 
Swamp Fox who hunted the British redcoats out 
of South Carolina, and he is reading up the rifle- 
men of the swamps and forests of the Southland 
who drove the last remnants of Great Britain 
from the United States in 1815, when Andrew 
Jackson, the son of an expatriated Irish linen 
weaver, from Carrickfergus, defeated Paken- 
ham at New Orleans. And when he considers 
his cotton losses and the history of his coun- 
try, his viewpoint of Germany changes won- 
derfully. 

Thomas Jefferson, Secretary of State, writing 
to Ambassador Pinckney at London, said: 
"Great Britain might feel the desire of starving 
an enemy nation, but she can have no right of 

[35] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

doing it at our loss nor of making us the instru- 
ment of it." 

Great Britain has destroyed the commerce of 
the United States, an innocent party in the war, 
with Germany, Austria-Hungary, and Turkey, 
and to an important extent with neutrals like 
Denmark, Holland and Italy. Her policy of 
starving Germany out is actually creating more 
cases of starvation in the United States than in 
Germany. There are few unemployed in Ger- 
many, because the government has succeeded in 
paying wages, through public and private work, 
to all left at home. 

Let us see why so many workmen in American 
agricultural implement factories are idle. Last 
year Germany bought of us $3,000,000 worth of 
mowers and reapers; hay rakes, $64,000; plant- 
ers, $20,000; plows, $213,000; threshers, $261,- 
000. At $2.50 per day in wages, that loss ac- 
counts for nearly 5,000 idle men. In brass goods 
she took $1,642,000, which loss throws 2,000 
brass workers out of work. Starving out the 
Germans and Austrians will cost the farmers of 
the United States not less than $40,000,000 in a 
year. 

Germany absorbs one-half of the exported 
[36] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

American wood alcohol used in the arts. Last 
year she with Austria took $50,000,000 of our 
copper and copper wares. Averaging the wages 
of the Montana and Michigan miners at $4 per 
day, that means 40,000 copper miners and work- 
ers added to the bread line. In bleached cotton 
cloth she took from us $1,260,000; cotton waste, 
$1,000,000; corsets, $88,000; mixed goods, $178,- 
000; phosphate, $2,700,000; binder twine, $91,- 
000; dried apples, $1,208,000; ripe apples,$l,209,- 
000; apricots, $800,000; peaches, $170,000; 
prunes, $2,110,000; glue, $78,000; rubber goods, 
$1,200,000; shoes, $132,000; iron and steel 
products, $4,800,000; adding machines, $370,000; 
cash registers, $1,200,000. 

Now figures are usually dry reading and we 
will not continue, but the statement can be safely 
made that England, by declaring practically 
everything contraband intended for Germany 
and Austria, excepting cotton, has thrown out 
of employment and reduced to a state of want 
from 350,000 to 450,000 men, to say nothing of 
the fearful curtailment of trade an'd traffic in 
other directions. 

The oldest living Americans recall the days 
when the American flag flew over thousands of 

[371 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

fast clippers, when more than three-fourths of 
the commerce of our country was carried in 
American bottoms. He reads from his history 
how England took advantage of the Civil War 
to seize American trade and, having destroyed 
our commerce as our country lay prostrate, the 
oldest citizen is surprised at the present genera- 
tion, which seems supine and helpless to protect 
its own products from the dominant power on 
the high seas. Men are asking themselves, at 
this hour, by what right does England persist in 
destroying our commerce, making an innocent 
nation suffer and increasing the store of human 
misery in this country. The patriotic American 
is insisting on an answer to the query why Amer- 
ican products on the high seas should not be held 
as sacred as though they were on land. The 
world may be suffering from Militarism, but 
America surely is declining because she is held 
at the mercy of a relentless foreign Navalism. 

The American war of 1812 with England was 
due chiefly to British interference with our ex- 
port trade. The writer has read the famous de- 
bate from the annals of Congress in January, 
1812. John Randolph, of Virginia, denounced 
the bill to increase the army. He denounced his 

[38 1 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

colleagues in the Senate who resented the un- 
friendly commercial acts of England in taking 
American goods as contraband. He was an- 
swered by Senator John C. Calhoun, of South 
Carolina, who said: "A nation commands re- 
spect which insists on protecting its commerce. 
We resent the depredation on every branch of 
our commerce, including our direct export trade 
and the products of our fields and farms. What 
shall we do, abandon or defend our own commer- 
cial and maritime rights and the personal liber- 
ties of our citizens in exercising them?" 

One of the greatest men of the period, perhaps 
the greatest, was Henry Clay, of Kentucky, 
thrice a candidate for President, the idol and 
leader of the Whig Party. He was speaker of 
the House of Representatives and on the last day 
of December, 1811, he took the floor to defend 
the army measure, and he said: 'Tor argu- 
ment's sake, let us concede the fact that the 
French Emperor is aiming at universal empire; 
can Great Britain challenge our sympathies 
when, instead of putting forth her arms to pro- 
tect the world, she has converted the war into a 
means of self-aggrandizement; when, under pre- 
tence of defending them, she has destroyed the 

]39] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

commerce and abused the rights of every neutral 
nation and trampled on the rights of every na- 
tion; when she has attempted to annihilate every 
vestige of the public maritime code of which she 
professes to be the champion? Shall we bear the 
cuffs and scoffs of British arrogance because we 
may entertain chimerical fears of French subju- 
gation? . . . We cannot secure our independ- 
ence of one power by a dastardly submission to 
the will of another. . . . When did submission 
to one wrong induce an adversary to cease his 
encroachments on the party submitting? But we 
are told that we ought only to go to war when 
our territory is invaded. How much better than 
invasion is the blocking of our very ports and 
harbors, insulting our towns, plundering our 
merchants, and scouring our coasts? If our 
fields are surrendered, are they in a better con- 
dition than if invaded? When the murderer is 
at our doors, shall we meanly skulk to our cells, 
or shall we boldly oppose him at the entrance?" 
The English financial reports, commenting on 
the condition of the British Empire after six 
months of the war, reached New York about 
February 4, 1915. They fully corroborate the 
claim of the writer that the United States is really 

[40] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

the chief industrial sufiferer of all the great na- 
tions. Our people have been strung along and 
out-ntanoeuvred by the clever wiles of English 
diplomacy. The salve of flattery extended from 
the hands across the sea will not heal the business 
bruises dealt to Brother Jonathan by the clever 
financiers of Lombard Street. While the bread 
line lengthens in America, the unemployed are 
decreasing throughout England. The Cunard, 
White Star, Red Star, Anchor and other English 
steamship lines, headed by the dominating Eng- 
lish interests in Wall Street, have intrigued so 
well at Washington that all parties are playing 
into their hands and no relief is to be afforded 
American shipping. More frightful will be the 
peril to the United States if the submarine cam- 
paign launched by the Germans against merchant 
ships flying the British flag should continue as 
successful as it has begun. Nearly all of our 
commerce to Europe is carried in vessels flying 
the Union Jack, so helpless and unimportant are 
we on the ocean. Discerning Americans perceive 
that England, not Germany, has brought about 
this destruction of American shipping. We are 
not deceived by the figures showing increased ex- 
ports. Our working men in urban centres know 

[41] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

that wheat mounting up to $2 per bushel pads the 
export trade more than wheat at ninety cents per 
bushel, and corn, oats, barley and other farm 
products likewise. They realize the loaf of bread 
is six cents instead of five cents, and that means 
an extra tax of $16,000,000 on the breadeaters 
of New York City alone. The export of war- 
priced ammunition, wagons, horses, etc., etc., is 
no proof of a return to prosperity. The writer 
within a week has seen no sign of diminishment 
in the great armies of idle men surrounding 
American factories. 

Many American cotton mills are idle and many 
more are working on part time. The spinners 
and other cotton operatives' unions report more 
idle men and women than at any period since the 
year 1893. The cotton trade in England is boom- 
ing. The Lancashire mills, with low-priced 
American cotton, are running day and night. 
British consols are selling as well and at as high 
a figure as before the war. Great Western Rail- 
way shares of England, selling before the war at 
114, are selling at 115 ; the same is noticed in the 
standard English railway shares. All of the 
English boats are rolling vip enormous profits, 
while our Senators fight over personal, political 

[42] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

and extraneous questions, and cannot agree on 
any shipping policy. While Nero was fiddling, 
Rome was burning. Iron and steel in the United 
States is too cheap to be made at a profit and sold 
abroad on account of the freight rates being 
tripled by English ship owners. Whereas, the 
iron and steel trade of the English makers is 
flourishing. The United States Steel Company 
has cut out the dividend on its common stock, 
affecting very many thousands of investors, while 
the principal English steel mills declared divi- 
dends last month. The British manufacturer is 
attacking the Germans successfully in the former 
markets of the latter and organizing an effective 
foreign trade campaign because they have the 
ships. We have nothing but sympathy for the 
Allies and only relief ships for Belgium and few 
commercial ships to fly the Stars and Stripes on 
the seven oceans. The leading Anglo-American 
weekly is Harper's Weekly, and Great Britain has 
made times so "good" in America that Harper's 
Weekly is destitute of advertising. Despite six 
months of the war, the English coal exports only 
fell off 17,353,000, while ours fell off 31,000,000 
tons. The American woollen manufacturing trade 
is depressed, while the English woollen business is 

[43] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

steadily improving. In six months the American 
woollen trade is reduced 24 per cent. ; in England, 
less than 18 per cent. In 1913 Great Britain ex- 
ported 97,593,400 yards of linen to the United 
States, and increased the amount to 107,550,300 
yards in 1914, despite the war. A fair evidence 
of the prosperity of the English people rests in 
the figures showing a gain per capita in the 
amount of tea, coffee and sugar consumed. The 
imports and exports of silk by England have in- 
creased over 1913 and the year 1912. With Ger- 
many and France, in spite of the war, having 
found means to properly provide for the unem- 
ployed, with England doing up America in the 
trade of Europe, Asia and Africa, the question is 
often asked by the students of history. After fifty 
years of unexampled prosperity, have American 
business men grown stale and become enervated 
by past successes? Are they wanting in the in- 
itiative, daring, resource and alertness of their 
fathers, who built a merchant marine that coped 
with England successfully for half a century? 

This is the 15th day of February, 1915. The 
bread line grows instead of receding, and the 
world is in the seventh month of the war. The 
price of bread throughout the City of New York 
has risen another cent per loaf. The pangs of 

[44] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

hunger have reached the iron and steel districts 
of Cleveland, Chicago, Pittsburgh, and other 
cities. Vast armies of the worried mechanics and 
laborers congregate about the shops and factories. 
Special patrols are established along the railway 
lines to keep men off the tracks, who, being pen- 
niless, are trying to steal free rides in the hope of 
getting work in the next town. 

The writer has seen the bread line this month 
in some seven American cities. One does not 
have to visit Europe to see the human misery 
caused by the war. 

Elbert H. Gary, Chairman of the Mayor's 
Committee on Unemployment, reports on Feb- 
ruary 8, 1915, that there are 200,000 more un- 
employed in New York City than last Winter. 
The Metropolitan Life Insurance Company can- 
vass shows cases of unemployment in 35,000 out 
of 146,000 families whose members insured in 
that company. 

The custom collectors for all the important 
ports in New York report officially to the Secre- 
tary of the Treasury that there is an enormous 
congestion of farm products and merchandise of 
all kinds in every port in the United States which 
cannot be transported to Europe for want of 
American ships. 

[45] 



CHAPTER IV 

ALSACE 

Most Americans have sympathized with France 
in the loss of her provinces, Alsace and 
Lorraine, as the result of the Franco-Prussian 
war of 1871. This sentiment is worthy, but is 
not founded on material grounds to-day, because 
the record shows that this detached territory is 
far more prosperous under German administra- 
tion. In forty years the population of Alsace- 
Lorraine has nearly tripled, and produces a vast 
amount of grain, tobacco, iron and coal, and with 
an area of only 5,580 square miles, one-sixth the 
area of Ireland, is a veritable beehive of cotton, 
woollen, silks and chemical industries. 

Contrast the state of Alsace-Lorraine with 
that of misgoverned Ireland, where the popula- 
tion is to-day only one-third of the number of 
people living in Ireland seventy years ago. 

While English rule has been draining the life- 
blood of Ireland, leaving only the remnants of a 
people, this little territory along the banks of 
the Rhine has gone forward by leaps and bounds, 

[46] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

with the people so contented that sentiment alto- 
gether throughout the province has steadily 
changed in favor of Germany, and the Alsatians 
have furnished their full quota of soldiers for 
the Fatherland. Ireland, too, has iron and coal, 
and couM manufacture cotton, wool and silks, but 
it is not for the commercial interest of England 
to have an industrial Ireland. She must always 
be confined under the British Empire to remain 
an agricultural spot, a rear garden to supply food 
for England. 

The district of Alsace-Lorraine contains the 
same percentage of Roman Catholics as Ireland, 
about 7(i per cent. The beautiful Rhine flows all 
along its borders, filled with vessels carrying 
commerce of the province to the world. The 
River Shannon of Ireland is as grand and as 
beautiful, but you may go along its shores for 
days and never see a sail. The land along the 
Shannon is as rich and fertile as the lands on 
the banks of the Rhine. The harbors of the Ger- 
man river are no safer or deeper. For every 
$128 owned by an Irishman, the Alsatian pos- 
sesses $915. The farmer of these annexed Ger- 
man provinces can sell the products of his farm 
to any country of the world on the same basis as 

[47] 



( 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

any other province or colony of the German Em- 
pire. The Irish farmer must market his cattle 
and farm products through English ports alone. 
If he has cows or sheep to sell on the Continent 
he must first ship them to England, divide the 
profit with the middleman there, and take what 
is left. It was this infamous method of trade 
suppression that led to the successful revolution 
of the American colonists, who rebelled against 
laws which required American farmers to ship 
their products through English market channels. 

Germany removed from the provinces of Al- 
sace-Lorraine unjust, artificial checks, and pro- 
tected, rather than discouraged, the industries of 
her new provinces, which has steadily weakened 
the old attachment for France. The provinces of 
Alsace-Lorraine, with little more than one-half 
the population of Ireland, has sent 104,000 troops 
to the front in France for Germany, whereas, up 
to the 10th of October, scarcely 10,000 recruits 
had been secured in all of Ireland. 

In Ireland the people are not let know the 
extent of the German victories on land and sea, 
lest the knowledge would interfere with the ex- 
traordinary methods of securing recruits for the 
British armies. The Home Rule Bill, signed by 

[48] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

King George, to be amended by Ulster and to go 
into effect after the war, is the recruiting bait. 
Economic pressure will never permit Ireland to 
become a near commercial competitor of Eng- 
land. The latter with its 38,000,000 of people con- 
gested on a small island, cannot afford to have Ire- 
land manufacture the same line of goods. She 
must be confined to the products of the soil, to 
linens, and food products. Hence, a Home Rule 
measure which expressly prohibits Ireland from 
foreign commerce save through the British Par- 
liament. 

The Parliamentary Party is called Nationalist 
— a misnomer. 'Tis a far cry, hearkened back 
a century, from Mr. Redmond's purely local 
measure, installing his followers in the offices ex- 
pected through the execution of the bill, to the 
dying request of Robert Emmet forbidding his 
countrymen to write his epitaph until Ireland 
should become a free nation. 

Who knows in the fulness of time but that 
Germany and destiny will write Emmet's 
epitaph ! 

As for the descendants of the Celts, if the 
issue is, according to Mr. Joseph H. Choate, the 
"intense hatred of Germany for England and her 

[49] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

lofty ambition to establish a world empire upon 
the ruins of the British Empire, their answer 
is: "The British Empire ruined Ireland — she 
can fare no worse and, with the friendship of 
Germany, her lot may be bettered." 



[50] 



CHAPTER V 

GERMANS IN THE UNITED STATES 

Europe, not England, is the Mother Country of 
America. Of the white men and women within 
the borders of the United States, we should be 
safe in asserting that at least twenty per cent, 
are of German stock. To call such a people 
Huns, vandals and barbarians should be con- 
sidered ridiculous in this country. They form 
one of the best elements in our vast heterogeneous 
and cosmopolitan population. The Germans 
make first-class American citizens; they are 
patriotic, literate and industrious; thrifty, sensi- 
ble and modest. Many Americans marvel at the 
patience of these worthy people, under the calum- 
nies hurled by thousands of vilifiers at the land 
of their fathers and mothers. 

From the dawn of American independence the 
German emigrants have been the friends of 
American freedom. They fought bravely and 
loyally on many American battlefields and they 
have given this country the greatest help in fur- 
nishing steadiness and stability of character. 

[51] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

It was Johann DeKalb, of Huttendorf, Ba- 
varia, who accompanied Lafayette to the side of 
George Washington in 1777. He served as 
major general of the Continental armies in New 
Jersey and Maryland until April, 1780. He lost 
his life in the battle of Camden in August, 1780. 
The writer remembers, near his boyhood home, 
the town Steuben, where the illustrious patriot, 
Friedrich Wilhelm Steuben, died in 1794. Sec- 
ond only to the immortal Washington, this gal- 
lant German soldier held up the courage of the 
starving patriots in the dark winter nights of 
Valley Forge. He gave up his own food to the 
privates. Washington acknowledged that to 
Steuben's, more than any other influence, was 
due the superb discipline and organization of the 
patriotic rebel army. It was he who received 
the first offer of capitulation from Lord Corn- 
wallis, the British commander-in-chief. 

In the Civil War the Germans dyed the fields 
of the South with their blood. The Union could 
not have been saved without them. In April, 
1861, as the gallant Irish 69th New York Regi- 
ment was marching down Broadway, their band 
playing ''Garry Owen" and 'The Star Spangled 
Banner," on their way to join the Army of the 

i52] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

Potomac, three German regiments from Cincin- 
nati, Wisconsin and St. Louis were on their 
way to meet them. Patrick Sarsfield Gilmore, 
the noted bandmaster, used to tell of the German 
military bands playing Irish airs on St. Patrick's 
Day along the banks of the Potomac. 

General Carl Schurz distinguished himself at 
the battle of Manassas and in the campaign in 
Tennessee. He became U. S. senator from Mis- 
souri, and as a statesman, writer and patriot he 
ranks as one of the foremost Americans. The 
German veterans of the Grand Army of the Re- 
public recall the glories of the blond-haired Ger- 
man boys **who fought mit Sigel" in the Civil 
War. Franz Sigel was a son of Baden, who or- 
ganized the first German regiment in New York. 
He was a hero of Carthage and Pea Ridge and 
he went down to enduring fame when, with 4,000 
men, he held Maryland Heights against General 
Early and 15,000 men in 1864. 

The first German immigrants settled in Penn- 
sylvania, and their agricultural settlements were 
such that they were visited and studied by our 
Eastern colonist agriculturalists. The Thirty 
Years' War, extending over the soil of disunited 
and dismembered states, had wrought ruin and 

[53] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

destruction on homes and people when the Ger- 
man, Furly, obtained a grant of land in Eastern 
Pennsylvania and gathered his emigrants from 
along the banks of the Rhine. They landed at 
Germantown (which is now part of the city of 
Philadelphia) in 1683. These Germans were 
the first of our foreigners to organize against 
slavery. Then others came to New Jersey and 
New York, founding towns with such typical 
German names as Saugerties, Rhinebeck, Ger- 
man Flats, Mannheim and Palatine, N. Y. They 
settled Berks County, Pennsylvania, then Mont- 
gomery and Lancaster Counties, then they 
trekked on to Maryland, Virginia and North 
Carolina in 1732. 

They reached Georgia from Salzburg in 1734, 
followed by the Wurtembergers. When the 
War of 1812 broke out the German young men 
joined the army of Andrew Jackson and did their 
share in driving the British out of this country. 
From the year 1841 to 1900 — sixty years — there 
have been added to our population not less than 
5,000,000 Germans. The marvellous prosperity 
of Germany under the reign of the present Em- 
peror has checked emigration, so that few of 
these worthy and welcome emigrants have been 

[54] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

coming to our shores in recent years. Men and 
women of German extraction dominate in num- 
bers the cities of Cincinnati and Milwaukee and 
are powerful elements in Chicago, St. Louis, In- 
dianapolis, Buffalo, Cleveland and Baltimore. 
In New York City they form about twenty per 
cent, of the population. In religion there are 
about as many Catholic as Protestant German- 
Americans. 

The German character has been an important 
element in the upbuilding of the United States. 
They are our largest savings bank depositors and 
home builders; their instrumental music and 
their singing societies have brought many happy 
hours to American hearts and homes. Their love 
of children have made them the toymakers of 
the world. The Nuremberg toymaker was 
freezing in the trenches last Christmas eve and 
many an American child felt the effect of his 
absence. 

America has reason to be thankful for the ad- 
vent of German people to her shores and for the 
long and constant friendship of the German Em- 
pire. Our country has had two wars with Eng- 
land and has been on the verge of two more — 
in 1861 and in 1893. We have been at war with 

[55] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

Spain, with Tripoli and with Mexico, and we 
have been nearly at war with France. With 
Germany we have not had the slightest misun- 
derstanding, and her government and people have 
always been our good friends. We have broken 
our treaty with Russia because American Jew- 
ish citizens cannot cross her territory. No 
greater calamity could befall modern civilization 
than the dismemberment of Germany with the 
aid of medieval and intolerant Russia. More 
power, say we all, to the strong arm of the gal- 
lant and resolute von Hindenburg in the East, 
who so far has resisted Russian invasion of Ger- 
many. 

No country, excepting the United States, per- 
haps, has, in the past forty years, made such 
advances in economic production as Germany. 
Americans owe this wonderful people a great 
debt for the instruction the Germans have given 
them in chemistry, medicine, surgery, electricity, 
in waterpower development, inventions and vari- 
ous discoveries and improvements in art and 
science. The Germans taught our farmers how 
to avoid waste and how to increase crops. Their 
municipal governments are the models from 
which our progressive city officials draw their 
most valuable lessons. Germany was the suc- 

[56] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

cessful pioneer in workmen's compensation laws, 
which were first copied in this country by Wis- 
consin, where the Germans are so numerous and 
influential. Insurance against accident, disease, 
death and old age is thirty years old in the 
Fatherland. The German success, against great 
natural obstacles, is due to a wonderful spirit 
of co-operative effort, organization, thorough- 
ness and solidarity. 

We know the traits of the Germans in Amer- 
ica. A people who can hymn for the Father- 
land on the battlefield, who love their homes and 
who are kindly and hospitable, their enemies will 
never convince us in the United States that they 
could become aggressors against the peace and 
civilization of the world. The Germans in 
America are the same in heart, in character and 
in feeling as the people of the Fatherland. They 
could not be disloyal if they tried. 

No less an American authority than the late 
United States Senator John Sherman of Ohio, 
when Secretary of the Treasury, said that the 
whole of Germany, including the government, 
was the friend of the Union in the Civil War. 
Prussia loaned a large amount of money to the 
United States when our country was hard 
pressed. 

[57] 



CHAPTER VI 

WHY ENGLAND WILL NEVER GRANT FREEDOM TO 
IRELAND 

"Every attempt to govern Ireland has been 
from an English standpoint, and as if for the 
benefit of Englishmen alone." — Dr. Thomas 
Addis Emmet. 

England will always remain the sole enemy of 
Ireland. Economic and industrial pressure make 
her the natural and logical destroyer of Irish in- 
dustry and commerce. If I were an English man- 
ufacturer or trader I, too, would help to crush 
any movement to make Ireland free. We would 
not want a rival in our own line at our shoulder, 
cutting down our profits and interfering with our 
commercial success. Self-preservation is the first 
law of nations as well as individuals. England 
has fixed the limits in the shape of an Irish truck 
garden which will furnish food for the English 
green hills of Inishowen, overlooking the wonder- 
ful harbor of Lough Swilly, County Donegal, de- 
serted then, but at present holding the great Brit- 
ish fleet. Twenty miles from this spot the super- 

[58] 




ROBERT EMMET 

"When my country takes her place among the nations of 
the earth, then, and not till then, let my epitaph be written." 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

dreadnaught Audacious sank to the bottom of the 
sea at the hands of a deadly torpedo launched by 
a German submarine.* Nowhere in the world 
are there so many great natural harbors as on 
the west coast of Ireland — Donegal Bay, Sligo, 
Killala, Clew, Galway Bays, the mouth of the 
Shannon, and Dingle Bay could hold the fleets 
of the world. 

Ireland contains 33,000 square miles, England 
58,000. Ireland is more fertile than either Eng- 
land or Scotland. The population of England is 
close to 35,000,000; Ireland is stripped down to 
4,000,000 of inhabitants, and ought to be able 
to support in comfort 15,000,000 of people. The 
island contains coal, iron, marble, copper and 
various resources not possible of development be- 
cause of English control and opposition. Her 
industries are confined to a small section of the 
Northeast, held in hand by the descendants of in- 
vaders, fortified originally by conquest, and rarely 
do you find a pure native holding any important 
business station in any of the thirty-two counties 
of the island. The prevailing fashion is to class 
the natives as lazy and incompetent without scru- 

♦Although three months have passed since the Audacious was 
sunk, no Irish newspaper has published the news. 

[59] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

tinizing the historic and economic reasons which 
have brought them to their present phght and 
left them at the mercy of the conquerors. Few of 
her critics take into account the repressive com- 
mercial codes of centuries, lifted too late, in part, 
to restore industry. The English Parliament 
enacted laws which ruined the once prosperous 
manufacturing industries of the country. As 
soon as Ireland developed an important direct ex- 
port trade, England crushed the life out of it by 
export tariffs, hostile duties aimed at Irish ex- 
ports solely. At one time Irish woollens were the 
first in Europe. The output of her looms found 
their way to all the cities of the continent. The 
cloth makers of England successfully petitioned 
the Parliament to place an arbitrary, preferential 
export duty on Irish woollens, which annihilated 
the industry. That trade never recovered from 
the blow. England gave bounties to manufac- 
tures in various lines, subsidies to ships, but none 
went to Ireland. After bankrupting Ireland, she 
removed these restrictions in the midst of the Con- 
tinental war, exactly as she promises Home Rule 
now, as an emergency measure to superinduce re- 
cruiting for the British army. The Irish Volun- 
teers of a hundred years, or more, ago were or- 

[60] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

ganized as the result of the suppression of Irish 
trade. They forced the government to supply 
them arms in the same maner as the Irish Volun- 
teers of to-day. The great wars on the continent 
frightened England into granting an Irish Par- 
liament in 1782, which was taken away from 
Ireland twenty years later. Pensioners of the 
government and traitors destroyed the national 
cause then as they are trying to do to-day. That 
brief period of a free country was the one bright 
epoch of modern Irish history. The factories 
were occupied and increasing in numbers and 
output, the harbors were filled with ships, and 
immigration exceeded emigration. Irish inde- 
pendence and growing commerce aroused fear- 
ful jealousies on the part of her more powerful 
neighbor, who proceeded to crush Ireland again 
by acts of repression. This led to rebellion 
and bloodshed and the execution of Rob- 
ert Emmet, followed by the destruction of Irish 
industries. Then came seventy years of horror, 
broken only by the gurgling cries of a strangled 
people. Young Ireland rose in 1848, led by a 
dozen educated young men, but the effort was 
futile. Famine had done to death a million people 
the year before, another million fled to foreign 

[6i] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

shores, the life blood of the nation was exhausted, 
but her children, scattered to the four corners of 
the earth, preserved good memories. 

One afternoon I was in a small boat on Sligo 
Bay, a place visited by few tourists. Scarcely a 
sail was visible in the great harbor provided by 
nature, neglected by man. We were rowed up 
the Garvogue River by a very old man to Lough 
Gill. No lake or mountain scenery in Switzer- 
land or Colorado is more beautiful. And yet 
no boat nor hotel nor sign of habitation on that 
lake or near it. Six miles distant was the dying 
city of Sligo with 10,000 inhabitants, old and 
poor, the remnants of a stricken race. Sligo has 
nothing to show at the end of 900 years but the 
melancholy ruins of a once flourishing town, her 
aged men and women and their rags. Long since 
the most of the stalwart youth departed for for- 
eign shores. In the long twilight we saw the 
Irish Volunteers drilling on the green turf, grim 
and silent. They speak low in Sligo, almost like 
a whisper, the faces seem to have recorded in them 
the lines of the woes of centuries, and in the si- 
lence of the day they eye the great harbor, un- 
flecked by the white sails of their childhood ; and 
they seem to look across the seas to their chil- 

[62] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

dren in America. There was a day when the 
cattle ships for the Continent stopped at Sligo. 
When the cattle is sold now it must be first 
shipped on a small steamer to Glasgow or Liver- 
pool. The English middleman must have his 
profit. Iron is abundant in Sligo, but no captains 
of industry are there to mine it. An Irish- Ameri- 
can dredging contractor who stood near said that 
with men and money he could make that harbor 
one of the world's best located shipping ports. 

As a race the Irish do not excel in finance, in 
bartering or in trading, although it must be said 
that in the last three decades they have shown con- 
siderable advancement in those lines of commer- 
cial efifort. But in huge constructive projects they 
are foremost. As railroad and tunnel builders, 
penetrating mountains, damming rivers, sea 
dredging, building skyscrapers, harnessing the 
forces of nature, the sons of the Irish bog and 
ditch diggers, the children of the emigrant labor- 
ers, are the great engineering contractors of the 
world. They are daring and fearless, no physical 
difficulty seems to awe them and they tackle the 
most dangerous operations which involve the loss 
of life and money underground. In a syndicate 
of fifteen men, who ofifered the United States Gov- 

[63] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

ernment to build the Panama Canal, thirteen bore 
Irish names. These are the practical men of 
affairs, badly needed in Ireland, who could lead 
the way for the industrial development of the 
country if her English fetters were removed. 

That her sons can succeed in keen commercial 
struggle is admitted throughout the world. The 
only two Irish parliamentary leaders known to 
the present generation are the late Charles Stew- 
art Parnell and the present Mr. Redmond. Both 
men are of the land-owning class and view Ire- 
land from an agrarian rather than an indus- 
trial point of view. The Land Act has proved a 
great blessing to agricultural Ireland. It was 
passed by the Tory party. Parnell was a revolu- 
tionary and a Protestant, although a practical 
statesman. He led successfully the Land League 
movement, founded and organized by Michael 
Davitt. I first met him in America as a boy thirty 
years ago. He looked more like a college pro- 
fessor than an Irish agitator and he hated the 
English Government of all parties thoroughly and 
whole heartedly, and never disguised his hate. 
Redmond was supposed to be one of his disciples, 
and we heard Redmond say in Buffalo one night, 
"I would tear with my own hands into shreds the 

[64] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

British Act of Union with Ireland." He got 
$14,000 from the audience that evening. Poor 
Parnell lies in his grave, under a green sward, in 
Glasnevin Cemetery, Dublin. No monument is 
there, but a fine one commemorates his memory in 
Parnell Square, Dublin ; and one bright May day 
I saw some men and women placing great wreaths 
of flowers on that silent grave. One was marked, 
"Done to Death. From the workingmen of the 
Midland Railroad"; another read, "From the 
women linen workers of Antrim," and another, 
"Sacred to the memory of our chief. From the 
lace workers of Kerry." The effort to side-track 
Nationalist Ireland, if the dead could speak, would 
make the voice from the tomb protest as Redmond 
appeals to the peasants to die for England. 

As a land owner, John Redmond, according 
to Irish reports, was one of the first to rush in and 
sell his estate to the tenants under the Wyndham 
land purchase act. He put the top figure on his 
land and secured the maximum figure from the 
land board, according to reports. Immediately the 
other landlords said, "Redmond is your leader, 
naturally he has vast influence with the land 
board ; we will take the same rate per acre as Red- 
mond." Good judges in Ireland say that this ex- 

[65] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

hibition of greed on the part of Redmond cost the 
tenants at least $9,000,000 in excess land prices. 

Parnell never cared for money and died poor. 
His motto on the land question was, ''Keep a firm 
grip on your homesteads." Redmond was finally 
made leader because he was a lieutenant of Par- 
nell. His London social environment has caused 
him to forget the dying warning of Parnell, "Ire- 
land, never trust England!" 

Mr. Redmond consented to leave out of "Na- 
tionalist Ireland" six counties, including the an- 
cient see of Armagh. This concession to the 
Orange Tories deeply shocked the real National- 
ists. Saint Patrick founded Christianity in Ire- 
land and built the first church at Armagh, in the 
year 445. The present cathedral, the see of St. 
Patrick, is the grandest church in Ireland, pre- 
sided over by Cardinal Logue. I happened to be 
within its walls one day in August last when the 
bells tolling overhead announced the death of His 
Holiness Pope Pius the Tenth. The Primate of 
all Ireland is marooned or sequestered under the 
amending act, as agreed to by Redmond, to get 
along as best he may or be thrown to the Orange 
wolves of Antrim (Belfast). A friend from 
Armagh writes that Redmond has been able to 

[66] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

secure only six Nationalist recruits in the town. 
No country can hope to be permanently pros- 
perous which is nearly or altogether dependent on 
farming. There must be manufacture and com- 
merce to furnish life blood for a nation. How 
much would the marvellous efficiency of Germany 
count for to-day in the world if she relied alone 
on intensive farming. England, having the ear 
of the world, pleads she went to war to save the 
small state of Belgium. Part of the world for- 
gets she destroyed the last surviving republics in 
Africa, the Transvaal and the Orange Free State, 
because of her greed for the diamond mines and 
the gold of Kimberly and Johannesburg. In the 
analysis of the Home Rule Bill I show that 
Ireland by its terms is effectually stopped from 
developing foreign trade, and is subjected to in- 
creased taxation from the burden of an office- 
holding brigade without being able to increase her 
resources from the profits of manufacture and 
commerce. 



[67] 



L 



CHAPTER VII 

WHAT GERMANY COULD DO FOR IRELAND 

Ireland, as a free and independent nation, with 
Germany as her friend and ally, could be made 
into an important industrial country. There is 
no hope for an industrial Ireland under English 
domination. The island, first of all, must have 
capital to develop railways, mines, waterpower 
and harbors to insure commerce. And that es- 
sential element English bankers will not supply; 
so long as Ireland is a West British agrarian col- 
ony no other country will furnish money for her 
development; and her own people are too poor 
to do it. The critics of Germany, since the war, 
ridicule the constant, pathetic, plea of German 
kiiltur. They do not realize that word has a dif- 
ferent meaning from "culture" in England or the 
United States. The German uses that word to 
define the social organization and its ramifica- 
tions, the efficiency, unity, solidarity and thor- 
oughness of an organized people. The writer at- 
tended two German schools in Syracuse when a 
boy and was trained first to think in the German 

[68] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

way. The writer well remembers the first and 
last thought of the German professor was to 
teach the child his lesson well and thoroughly. 
Your true German scholar is the most scientific 
of men, because he has mastered the difficult art 
of being thorough. 

England, eternally jealous and hateful of Ire- 
land, has never given her people any chance for 
scientific development. The door of hope is 
closed in this age of specialization to the sons of 
Ireland. In no sense could Ireland become an 
economic or commercial rival of Germany. Her 
geographical position, the character of her soil, 
her language, and the difference in her basic pro- 
ductions, would prevent her from becoming a 
trade rival of Germany.* The latter country 
would always want a friendly nation, just to the 

*The Irish railways are owned by the same capitalists who 
own the English railways and are interested in English manu- 
factures. Economic necessity requires that the Irish railways 
must always be kept secondary to the English lines and so han- 
dled as to transport farm products. They are rarely extended 
so that factories or minerals might be developed in Ireland. The 
concerted policy of England is to destroy Irish trans-Atlantic 
passenger ports in the same way they have destroyed Irish 
freighting direct to countries other than England. All of the 
large Cunard liners skip Queenstown, and the last large ship to 
drop the old port, from whence millions came to this country, 
was the White Star liner Olympic. In the year 1912 the_ Liver- 
pool Chamber of Commerce adopted a resolution calling on 
the directors of the Cunard Steamship Company to cut out land- 
ing or stopping in Ireland. 

[69] 






■^-^ 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

left of England, who could always be counted on 
as a friend in time of need. England only buys 
from Germany what she has to in manufactures 
and things chemical. She must first protect her 
colonies, who reciprocate with tariff preferences 
and trade agreements. Ireland, having no col- 
onies, would be able to trade on a large scale with 
Germany and the Continent. In many parts of 
the world, prior to the declarations of war, the 
Hamburg-American and the North German 
Lloyd steamship companies had taken away from 
English companies a vast amount of trade. On 
the shores of a friendly Ireland, the nearest of 
the British isles to the United States in distance, 
on the west coast, are wonderfully situated bays, 
where the harbors and docks could be so im- 
proved that the largest steamers would dock. 

England and France held Belgium, Japan and 
Portugal with them as allies by financing the 
government and the industries of those countries. 
There is a vast amount of English money invested 
in Belgian industrial properties. Under England 
an Irish bond or consol would not be worth the 
paper on which it was written. But, Ireland free, 
and a friend of Germany, could borrow funds 
from the latter to develop her great waterpower, 

[70] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

her commerce and industries. Looking ahead, 
Germany would plainly see that she would 
insure her future in the Atlantic Ocean and 
weaken England in the struggle for the world's 
trade by strengthening Ireland, who would also 
have the aid of the vast and prosperous German 
and Irish population in the United States. 

There is no other country in the Old World 
which could teach Ireland the things she needs 
the most in material development. The economic 
progress of Germany in the last twenty-five 
years is the period of the greatest development 
of any people. Ireland, excepting for brief 
periods of industrial and national freedom, has 
been struggling for centuries for her economic 
development in various forms, and in the year 
1915 is the poorest country on the continent. 
Germany, in the short space of twenty-five years, 
has become a rival of the British Empire in every 
country in the world. Dr. Karl Helfiferich, di- 
rector of the Deutsche Bank, in the view of the 
writer, has best expressed the German idea of 
kultur in the fewest words. 

The power that creates and increases the wealth of 
a people is labor, — from the purely manual labor of 

[71] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

the wage-earner to the purely intellectual labor of the 
scholar. 

The vehicle of labor is man, or — as regards the 
whole state — the population. 

The result of labor is the production of goods. 

The productivity of labor is intensified by perfect- 
ing technical equipment and organization. 

For the people as a whole the increased efficiency 
of labor finds expression in the statistics of produc- 
tion, trade, and transportation. 

The final purpose of economic labor is consumption. 

The surplus of goods produced over and above the 
necessary expense of production constitutes the in- 
come of the people. 

The surplus of the income of the people over their 
consumption constitutes the increment of the public 
well-being. 

The ideal economic development is that a growing 
population be able to increase the net efficiency of its 
labor, and thereby its "income," to such a degree that, 
at the same time, a higher standard of life — in other 
words, a more plentiful satisfaction of material and 
intellectual wants — and an enhancement of the public 
wealth be attained. 

Twenty-five years is a very short period in the 
life of a nation. Germany contained 48,000,000 
people in the year 1888, at the opening of the 
present war her population rose to 67,000,000. 
Her excess of births over deaths is 800,000 per 

[72] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

annum and she must find room and livelihood for 
her surplus population. 

The excess of births over deaths in Germany 
to every 1,000 inhabitants is 11 per cent., as com- 
pared with 9 per cent, in England, 9 per cent, in 
America and no excess in sterile France. To 
meet this rapidly growing population, Germany 
has been forced to find new means of remunera- 
tive employment. Her land is very old, she has 
been compelled to study scientific and intensive 
farming, and to acquire and make every known 
mechanism to draw food from the ground. 

More wonderful is her development in science 
and in applying scientific knowledge to labor. 
She leads the world in chemistry and physics and, 
perhaps, in electricity, her only real competitor 
being the United States. No country in the 
world has approached her in substituting skilled 
labor for common labor. This great change has 
been effected by machinery. She is foremost in 
the world's development of waterpower. Ger- 
many is ahead of all other countries in the use 
of gas engines. Her motors are the world's 
models. Liebig, a German chemist, worked out 
the theory of fertilizing soil which has proven 
the salvation of our older Southern States. In 

[73] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

dyes, tars, acids, use of by-products, use of car- 
bons, processes of making iron and steel, alumi- 
num, treatment of wood, preservatives, saving 
wastes, the whole world kneels at the feet of 
Germany; and, in a great degree, the ability of 
England, through her warships, has shut off 
these indispensable exports, thus increasing the 
human misery and, in some places, the starvation 
which prevails in the United States at present. 

The trade schools of Germany have been copied 
in all lands. In co-operative employment of 
workingmen, in old age pensions, in working- 
men's compensation acts, in employers' liability 
acts Germany has long led the world. All of the 
various employers' compensation measures in 
American commonwealths have been founded on 
German laws and experience. Her workingmen 
have $3,000,000,000 in savings banks and her 
working class supports the huge war loans. 
Aside from her savings banks, the co-operative 
savings societies of Germany hold $6,000,- 
000,000. One out of every four Germans, male 
or female, is a wage-earner. In sanitation, in 
public hygiene, in housing the people, she is first; 
whereas, England has more paupers than any 
country on the Continent, more people living in a 

[74] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

single room than any country in Europe or 
America. 

Thirty years ago Germany had 268,000 thresh- 
ing machines, to-day she has more than 
1,000,000; in 1882 only 19,000 mowing machines, 
to-day 301,000; she led the world in the last few 
years in her harvest yields per acre. 

The discovery that beets could be used to make 
sugar has cheapened and revolutionized the pro- 
duction of sugar; this very important discovery 
was made in Germany, which is first in beet- 
sugar production. By the year 1912 Germany 
had overtaken England in the production of coal 
and was second only to the United States. She 
is exceeded alone by our country in the produc- 
tion of iron. In thirty years her post-office re- 
ceipts have jumped from $95,000,000 up to $394,- 
000,000. The Reichsbank does a business of 
$85,000,000, the Deutsche Bank of $30,000,000 
per annum. Her railway employees doubled in 
twenty-five years. The only country in the world 
to come anywhere near equalling her in railway 
development in twenty-five years is the United 
States. Her inland waterways have reached 
the vast sum of 7,000,000 tons carrying capacity. 
In thirty short years she has actually tripled her 

[75] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

exports and incomes. Her nearest competitor has 
been the United States. Yet in thirty years, 
whereas the imports of the United States have 
increased 137 per cent., the imports of Germany 
gained 244 per cent. ; whereas, the exports of the 
United States gained 208 per cent, and Great 
Britain 119 per cent., Germany increased her ex- 
ports 185 per cent. 

In spite of a restricted and limited seacoast, 
Germany has become the second maritime power 
on the globe. Her banking system is the most 
elastic and perfect in the world and, considering 
that the war utterly destroyed her foreign com- 
merce, the fact that there have been no large 
, failures, no business panics or widespread unem- 
/ ployment and that all of the American corre- 

Ispondents agree in the statement that the Ger- 
man people, despite the cataclysm, feel least the 
I shock of any of the belligerents, we may well con- 
"^ elude that a New Ireland could learn its most 
\ useful lessons of progress from the culture and 
; firm friendship of the Fatherland. 
i A few days ago a distinguished United States 
Senator, in the Senate, debating the Immigration 
Bill, said: 

Germany has been developed to such a degree of 
[76] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

prosperity, during forty-four years of the German 
Empire, as to be able to utterly change her labor con- 
ditions. In the )^ear 1871 two-thirds of all German 
labor was common, the poorest paid labor. To-day 
two-thirds of all the labor in Germany is skilled labor, 
thrice the wages of common labor, and only one-third 
is common labor. The productiveness of Germany has 
been enormously increased, and that has been possible, 
in part, by reason of the fact that Germany has devel- 
oped skilled labor and intellect to a degree not 
equalled by any country in the world. 

That statement remains uncontroverted, and is 
proven by the facts and figures of the world's pro- 
duction and commerce. 

The "Home Rule Bill for Ireland" does two 
things, and two only. One is to fix her for all 
time as an agrarian country, with no labor but the 
poorest paid labor in the world, agricultural labor. 
The first is economic, the second is political; the last 
gives Ireland more secure control over purely local 
and internal legislation and produces 1,400 new polit- 
ical jobs for her various politicians.* 

England has done everything in its power to make 
war inevitable. — George Bernard Shaw. 

♦England sells to Ireland nearly $300,000,000 per year in manu- 
factures, which Ireland must pay back in farm products. The 
chief exports of Ireland are her children, her live animals, and 
her food, the three commodities needed most by the country. 
She sends her best cattle, hams, bacon and poultry to England, 
and her healthy ambitious boys and girls are sent abroad. 

[77] 



CHAPTER VIII 

HOW ENGLAND DESTROYED IRISH INDUSTRIES 

The Irish railways are not only inferior to 
American lines, but they are the poorest, the slow- 
est and the costliest in Europe. There are three 
or four fairly good express trains, but in the 
main the service is poor and would not be tol- 
erated in the New World. Suffering for want of 
industry, railroading or steam shipping does not 
pay in Ireland, hence transportation is handi- 
capped. Nowhere in a modern country is elec- 
tricity so far behind the times. There are nu- 
merous waterfalls and much natural water power, 
but that art of harnessing the forces of nature is 
practically unknown in Ireland. 

Robert Kane, in his "Industrial Resources of 
Ireland," says that the island contains great de- 
posits of valuable iron ore. England, as a com- 
petitor, prevented their development. All capi- 
tal, in large sums in Ireland, must be obtained 
from London, and no loans are made by which 
the mineral resources of the island could be used. 

Up to the year 1651 iron was exported to Eng- 
[78] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

land by Ireland, but prohibited from England by 
law as soon as English iron mines were inter- 
fered with by Irish competition. The same fate 
met Irish coal on the petition of the Wales coal- 
mine owners. As timber is necessary in shoring 
mines, all the timber near the mineral deposits 
was hewn and shipped abroad. There are 70,000 
acres of good quality of coal lands which have 
not been opened. Griffith, geologist, says solid, 
workable coal is found to the depth of 120 fath- 
oms. As late as 1846 about 26,000 tons of cop- 
per was produced. The clay in Ireland is ex- 
tensive in quality and deposits. The silk* and 
cordage industry flourished in the eighteenth 
century, but was killed off by arbitrary tariffs de- 
signed to destroy manufacture. 

In 1640 the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland (the 
Governor) wrote thus to his King: 

I am of opinion that all wisdom advises to keep Ire- 
land dependent on England as long as is possible, and 
estopped from the manufacture of wool. 

Nottingham said the object of English rule in 

♦Anthony N. Brady, of New York, who died recently and left 
the colossal sum of more than $100,000,000, was born in France, 
due to the fact that his father was an Irish silk weaver driven 
out of Ireland and who secured employment at his trade in 
Lyons, France. 

[79] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

Ireland is "to cramp, obstruct and render abortive 
the industry of the Irish." The Poyning Act 
compelled all vessels loaded in an Irish port to 
proceed to an English port, thus destroying the 
Irish merchant marine. Various navigation acts 
prevented Irish vessels from having direct Conti- 
nental trade. Cattle could be killed in Ireland, 
but the carcass must be sent to England. Acts 
of Parliament destroyed a once great wool in- 
dustry by requiring the sheep to be sent to Eng- 
land, and the price of wool to be fixed in London. 

Barlow's "Ireland" says: 

Deprived of the means of subsistence at home, 
thousands of Irish manufacturers emigrated to France 
and other countries, where they assisted the inhabi- 
tants in the augmentation and improvement of the 
quality of woollen goods. Another arbitrary measure 
excluded Ireland from trading with any British colony. 
Irish fishermen were prohibited from sending their 
boats off to the banks of Newfoundland. 

Adam Smith, the political economist, said: 

To prohibit a great nation from making all that they 
can of their own produce or industry is a manifest 
violation of the most sacred rights of mankind. 

In 1867 Lord Dufiferin wrote: 
From the reign of Queen Elizabeth, England never 
[So] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

for a moment relaxed her relentless grip on the trades 
of Ireland. One by one her industries were strangled 
until at last every fountain of wealth was hermetically 
sealed. 

Last fall the writer attended in Dublin a so- 
called National Exhibition of Irish Industries. 
The real Irish showing was pitiful — scarcely a 
single article of industry shown, aside from 
agriculture, raw material or minerals, was made 
in Ireland. All wares bore English or Continental 
trade-marks. 

And yet during the brief period of Irish inde- 
pendence, from 1782 to 1802, the commerce and 
industry of Ireland prospered. In 1798 the Earl 
of Clare said proudly, "There is not a nation on 
the face of the globe which has advanced in man- 
ufactures with the same rapidity." Her silks, 
cottons, fabrics, hats, soap, flannels, leather and 
other industries rose by leaps and bounds, amaz- 
ing the industrial world, until the relentless an- 
tagonism of England was aroused, and the con- 
queror again set at the fell work of destroying 
her competing neighbor. 



[8i] 



CHAPTER IX 



IRELAND S COMMERCE 



"Every Irishman owes it to his country, his 
race, and the world to work for the break-up of 
the British World Dominion. Either the Em- 
pire or Ireland must die. Until the Irish the 
world over get it into their heads that Ireland 
is NOW, as during the past 750 years, fighting 
for her very life against an unscrupulous and 
implacable enemy the cause of Ireland is hope- 
less." — John F. Kelly, Ph.D. 

In investigating an important or prosperous 
country one is confronted at once with a mass of 
valuable governmental data and a great variety 
of business works and reliable statistics. So few 
factories are there in most of Ireland, so little 
commerce, so few people directly interested in the 
subject, that, the government indifferent or neg- 
ligent, with only exceeding difficulty do we 
secure late or reliable data. When you go into 
the great bookstores of America, which advertise 
"Irish books, great variety," you will rarely find 
a volume on an Irish commercial subject. There 
will be mostly fiction, written from the English, 

[82] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

the wrong point of view, descriptions of ruins 
and scenery, fairy tales, ballad poetry, drama and 
sketches of Irish life. In dealing with this chap- 
ter we have to do the best we can within narrow 
but certain limits of information. 

The linen industry is the most important, and 
its survival was due originally chiefly to the 
superior quality of the flax sown on the fertile 
fields of Ireland. This industry is controlled 
by descendants of the invaders of the middle 
century, who drove the natives away from 
that section of the country into the bogs and 
mountains of the west. They have built up the 
important city of Belfast, which has become the 
largest town, containing, with its suburbs, some 
500,000 inhabitants. The place is busy but 
gloomy, and contains only one beautiful building, 
the City Hall. As a "loyal city," in the year 1637 
it won over Dublin the privilege of levying special 
duties on goods against the rest of Ireland, and 
that act of favoritism made it a seaport. It is 
naturally badly located as compared with a dozen 
harbors in Ireland, which have no commerce, but 
the ingenuity of man is employed to make up, in 
part, the natural deficiencies. Last year some 
30,000 ships entered or cleared the harbor, carry- 

[83] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

ing 3,500,000 tons. All the rest of Ireland 
cleared about 20,000 ships and not more than 
2,500,000 tons. The largest single industry is 
the great shipbuilding works of Messrs. Harland 
& Wolff, employing 12,000 workmen. I noticed 
the great new ship Britannic, over 50,000 tons, 
in the water last September. It will be too large 
to dock at Queenstown. As the large ships often 
skip Ireland, one can readily see how the com- 
merce of the country is affected. Some of the 
docks in Belfast are nearly 900 feet long. Very 
little of the capital operating any of the great in- 
dustries is Nationalist, which section is discrim- 
inated against in promotions and in the skilled 
trades. 

The Irish Sea fisheries are very valuable, but 
the profitable method of deep-sea fishing is to use 
steam trawlers, too costly a vessel for the native 
fisherman to buy, and the salmon industry is, 
therefore, neglected. Fifty years ago the Irish 
fisheries employed 56,000 men; now the number 
is not more than 24,000, and the business has 
passed over largely to Scotland and England. The 
Irish salmon sold last year was not more than 
$900,000, yet there is no finer salmon in the world. 
The coast abounds in herring and mackerel, but 

[84] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

lack of capital, organization, and the entrance of 
steam trawlers have caused its decline. In the 
year 1870 the cotton mills employed about 6,000 
hands. The industry is nearly dead, scarcely 500 
men being employed, the business having passed 
over to Lancashire. 

The Irish woollen industry within a century 
was larger than the linen industries, and its disap- 
pearance virtually sounded the death-knell of 
Irish manufacturing hopes, when 1,200 of her 
weavers emigrated to Philadelphia in 1870. The 
English manufacturers of woollens, alarmed by 
the popularity of Irish woollens throughout the 
continent, prevailed on Parliament, as I have 
stated before, to pass an act prohibiting Ireland 
from sending woollens abroad (see Encyclopedia 
Americana, Vol. IX, Ireland). The brewing 
and distilling business is the second largest indus- 
try and its preservation is due to the unique qual- 
ity of fresh water. It is the chief industry of 
Dublin. The laces and embroideries are largely 
manufactured in private homes by cottage women. 

The exports from Ireland direct to foreign 
ports is reduced to some $6,500,000 (1910), while 
the imports were some $54,000,000. With such a 
balance of trade against her, Ireland must con- 

[85] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

tinue to suffer until she has manufactures to send 
abroad and bring back money. 

Mr. John R Kelly, Ph.D., of Pittsfield, Mass., 
is furnishing a series of able letters for the Irish 
World on the subject of Irish industrial de- 
cline. Mr. Kelly has sent the writer a copy of a 
pamphlet entitled "A Plea for the Industrial Re- 
generation of Ireland," by Dr. Robert Ambrose, 
member of Parliament. As this writer has made 
a close analysis of the industrial and commercial 
necessities and possibilities of Ireland, it is pos- 
sible to use his data and argument. 

The water power of Ireland, the greatest in 
Europe in area, and the cheapest power for fac- 
tory purposes, is wholly undeveloped. The people 
burn peat from the bogs for fuel, for, although 
coal exists, it is not mined. By extracting the 
moisture from the peat, through a German process 
invented in 1897 (Stemmler), peat fuel could be 
used for manufacturing. Ireland contains iron, 
copper and coal. WJiat is it, then, inquires Dr. 
Ambrose, that keeps Ireland poor, and hozu can 
she give employment to her own children? He 
answers the great question with singular felicity, 
and we cannot improve on his words : 

"There are two conditions absolutely necessary 
[86] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

for the full development of the resources of any 
country. First, the fostering care of a native 
government elected by and responsible to the pub- 
lic opinion of that country. Second, free and un- 
fettered opportunities to trade with whomsoever 
that country wishes. Any country that is wanting 
in either of those two conditions is bound to go 
to the wall. Ireland is wanting in both. She has 
neither the blessings of the fostering care of a 
native government nor the free and unfettered 
opportunities of trading with whomsoever she 
likes. Therefore Ireland has gone to the wall." 

By what standard can you judge of the pros- 
perity of a country? 

1. By the standard of living. 

2. By its commerce and carrying power. 

3. By its export trade — 

(o) In manufactures. 
{b) In surplus produce. 

These are fair tests of the prosperity of a coun- 
try. In the standard of living the people of Ire- 
land are below the average on the continent. The 
low cost of their maintenance or subsistence per 
diem proves indubitably the force of this state- 
ment. Ireland exports considerable foodstuffs, 

[87] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

although small per capita. All political econo- 
mists agree that it is a bad sign when a country 
is compelled to export the most and the best of 
its food. For every dollar of exports, Ireland im- 
ports eight or ten dollars, for want of manufac- 
tures, and no advocate claims, in any way, that 
the proposed Home Rule Bill will materially de- 
velop the foreign trade or manufactures of Ire- 
land. It means that the people must use an in- 
ferior quality of products, and give to the world 
their best hams, bacons, flax, lace, cattle and but- 
ter. They must deny themselves of their own 
finest products and must sell their best to provide 
the necessaries of life. 

We spent nearly nine hours on the Irish rail- 
way, 170 miles, reaching Limerick from Sligo, a 
town of 40,000 inhabitants, the city being the 
centre of the vale, in the heart of one of the 
most fertile farming sections of the world, 
where it seemed as though every acre of green 
land could raise a wondrous crop, and yet here is 
a brief resume of the facts and figures of Lim- 
erick commerce : 

In 1852 the foreign tonnage at the port of 
Limerick amounted to 124,419 tons, and the 
British and coasting trade to 90,002 tons, making 

[88] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

a total of 214,421 tons. At the present time there 
is no government report of Limerick foreign ton- 
nage, because it is reduced to nothing and not 
worth recording, and yet there is no finer city in 
Ireland, aside from Dublin and Belfast. In the 
year 1854 the customs collected at Limerick the 
sum of $815,000, and 101 ships registered from 
this port. Seventy years ago the foreign exports 
from Limerick amounted to $6,000,000. The city 
then had several foundries, leather factories, 
soap, hat, hardware, glove, comb, linen, cotton 
factories, two paper mills, salt works, lace mill 
and twenty flour mills. All these plants have 
practically vanished. 

The port of Galway had a large tonnage at one 
time; nothing left to-day. In 1851 Galway con- 
tained fifty- four factories. As far back as 1835 
the town was busy with cotton and muslin works, 
exports in that year amounting to $1,250,000. All 
these industries have been transferred to Eng- 
land. 

Waterford is the place which sends Mr. Red- 
mond to the British House of Commons. Decay 
set in long ago, and the industries are in ruins. 
The woollen mills are no more. At one period 
there existed a cotton mill, eleven miles from the 

[89] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

place, which employed 1,800 persons. The raw 
cotton spun exceeded 2,000,000 pounds per year. 
The mill made 6,000,000 yards of bleached calico 
prints a year. The product of the mill was sent 
to foreign countries, but first through an English 
port. A famous glass works was in operation 
from 1783 up to 1852. The five shipyards have 
been vacated. In the year 1813, Waterford ex- 
ported to foreign lands goods in the large sum 
of $11,000,000. As late as the year 1835 the 
trade, exports and imports, amounted to $16,- 
700,000. New Ross sent twenty-seven merchant 
ships from her port in 1851 ; not one is left. The 
foreign trade of Wexford footed up $4,000,000 
in 1835. The yarn market and linen hall have 
been destroyed. 

In 1852 the foreign trade of Sligo amounted to 
$2,000,000; of Coleraine, $850,000; of Tralee, 
$250,000. Skibbereen, an interesting town in the 
County Cork, visited recently by the writer, is 
without commerce or industry, as formerly. At 
one period industry was flourishing. The exports 
in 1835 amounted to $200,000. 

CORK 

Cork was a flourishing city as late as 1852. 
She had a foreign trade of 184,678 tons and a 

[90] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

coasting trade of 472,701 tons, consisting of a 
fleet of 409 vessels. Some 260 clerks were em- 
ployed collecting the duties. The mills made 
woollens, canvas, sheetings, leather and shirts. 
One firm employed 1,000 hands making silk and 
lace. There were seven iron foundries, two brass 
mills, five shovel factories, and two ship yards. 
One of the first iron ships was built at Cork. In 
1835 the trade in and out of the port footed up to 
$28,000,000. 

In 1835 the exports from Youghal were esti- 
mated at $1,300,000. As late as the year 1851 
this port had registered 574 vessels. There is 
scarcely anything remaining of this commerce. 
In the year 1852 Westport possessed a foreign 
trade of about 20,000 tons, and a domestic trade 
of 8,000 tons, and 46 vessels were employed ; the 
customs amounted to $650,000. Ballina was an- 
other important port; its business is now quite 
dead. 

In the year 1853 Newry had a trade of 178,000 
tons. There were two spinning mills, costing 
$1 ,750,000. The ships of Newry sailed the Baltic, 
Mediterranean Sea, and were driven from the 
seas by a law which required them to reship and 
land at English ports. The exports in 1835 

[91] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

amounted to $4,200,000, the imports to $2,- 
800,000. Dundalk in the year 1853 had a trade of 
147,000 tons, with 28 regular ships, customs 
$192,000, cotton mills employing 2,000 hands. 
The goods of Dundalk were carried to St. Peters- 
burg, Riga, Dantzic, Rotterdam, Oporto and 
German ports. Drogheda had a trade of 260,000 
tons in 1852, and shipbuilding works, while thirty- 
five pilots worked out from that port. An iron 
foundry employed 300 men. The exports from 
Drogheda in the year 1835 amounted to $3,830,000 
and the imports to $1,280,000. 

DUBLIN 

In the year 1852 the shipping trade of Dublin 
amounted to 1,591,1 18 tons, with 464 vessels, cus- 
toms $4,670,000, and was the chief silk manufac- 
turing city of Great Britain. There were 28 iron 
and 21 brass foundries, long since disappeared. 
There were 114 cut-glass works, 43 carriage fac- 
tories, 21 paper mills, 18 hat factories and 168 
various manufactures. 

The writer has visited all of the cities of 
America and many foreign cities. Of the large 
towns seen, beyond a doubt the capital of Ireland 
is the poorest, the most squalid and miserable. 

[92] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

The only interesting" things about Dublin are the 
ruins of its former greatness, the cemeteries, 
parks and decaying structures. The monuments 
to the dead are notable. There is scarcely a ripple 
on the Liffey aside from some boats from a brew- 
ery. Fifty years more will see Dublin altogether 
an English city. The cockney songs of the Lon- 
don music halls are the favorites, and the bal- 
lad poetry of Ireland is disappearing, the street 
crowds have come to resemble the poor of Lon- 
don, and the patriots are harried. Many of the 
young politicians, the door of industry long closed, 
are secretly or openly endeavoring to get on the 
payroll of Dublin Castle or in the civil service, 
and that clever Irish politician and organizer, 
Joseph Devlin, and his practical henchman, Nu- 
gent, have landed many of them there. 

To sum up, under English misrule, the foreign 
trade of Ireland in sixty years has dwindled to 
a pitiful figure, so that to-day Ireland has prac- 
tically no commerce. How horrible is the betrayal 
of a decimated, stricken people by job-seeking 
leaders, who would destroy the remnants in order 
that their oppressors might be delivered from the 
vengeance of Germany! 

During this period the trade of England in- 
]93] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

creased to nearly 70,000,000 tons. The exports 
of little Holland last year, scarcely 1,000,000 
more inhabitants than Ireland, amounted nearly 
to a billion dollars; stricken Belgium to 
$680,000,000. 

As Ireland has little manufacturing outside of 
the northeast corner of the country, the various 
preferential tariff rates of the British colonies 
benefit England alone. As long as the control of 
factories and shipping lies in English hands, no 
treaty or preferential system of duties can hope 
to benefit Ireland. Her products are chiefly farm 
products, hams, bacon, eggs and poultry, which 
are shipped to England, a class of products which 
are not shipped abroad and exchanged for the 
products of British colonies favored by special 
tariff rates. The people of Ireland can only make 
arrangements as middle-men and ship their prod- 
ucts outside of England by indirection, through 
Liverpool or other English channels. 

In studying the commerce of Ireland and con- 
trasting the returns of the year 1913 with Ger- 
many, we find that on an average the business 
done by the average four inhabitants of Germany 
is equal to the commercial results of thirty-nine 
Irishmen. In Holland, a small country, the 

[94] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

wealth per capita is six times as great as Ireland. 
The English profess to despise the Turks, yet the 
average son of the Ottoman Empire possesses 
more of the world's goods than the Celt. The 
Irish prosper in all countries save and excepting 
Ireland. 

There is no chance for real Irish prosperity 
under English rule, unless the yoke of bondage is 
thrown off and the nation becomes free and inde- 
pendent and works out her destiny, with the aid 
of her successful sons and daughters throughout 
the world, and establishes a friendly alliance with 
a country which is not a natural or logical rival 
and is not interested in her exploitation. 

Let not the patriots remain discouraged. The 
watch fires of liberty burn for centuries. 

The nations have fallen and thou art still young. 
Thy sun is just rising when others have set. 

And though slavery's cloud o'er thy morning has hung, 
The full moon of freedom shall beam on thee yet. 



[95] 



When the German gunners fired the shots which 
struck the tower of the Cathedral at Rheims, that act 
was denounced as an Atrocity, although the army sig- 
nal scouts of the Allies occupied the tower. 

When the American gunners made the "beautiful 
shot" which struck the unoccupied tower of the ancient 
church at Vera Cruz, Mexico, who in the United States 
cried out — Atrocity? 



[96] 



CHAPTER X 

ENGLISH ATROCITIES IN IRELAND 

A FEW days after the taking of Louvain, Belgium, 
by the German army, I met a Roman Catholic 
bishop in Ireland, on the road from Dublin to 
Belfast. He was a strong character and a great 
prelate, at the head of an important diocese. The 
only news of the alleged atrocities at Louvain 
the earnest bishop had taken from the Dublin 
Freeman's Journal and the Belfast News-Letter. 
The news turned out to be false, as we have 
learned from the American newspaper correspon- 
dents who visited the scene. In Ireland, of course, 
no correction of the horrible falsehoods about 
German barbarisms have been made, and many 
natives actually believe stories of atrocities long 
since exploded in this country. The German 
atrocity game in the United States died with the 
return in October of Irving S. Cobb, of the Sat- 
urday Evening Post; John T. McCutcheon, of the 
Chicago Tribune; James O'Donnell Bennett, and 
the denials of the Associated Press and United 
Press correspondents. But the good bishop of 

[97] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

Ireland swallowed the story, and, in righteous in- 
dignation, said he would publicly denounce the 
German Huns and Vandals on the morrow. Lou- 
vain is a spot of tender memories in the Irish 
heart, and the English newspaper tricksters well 
knew their advantage in the references to "out- 
rages" at Louvain. 

The writer was reminded of the fact that the 
existence of an Irish seminary at Louvain was 
merely another historic evidence of tlie days when 
the English conquerors, under Cromwell, offered 
a reward of $25 for the head of every priest and 
$25, the same rate, for the head of wolves. 

The priests were hunted like wild beasts, and, 
in order to maintain a seminary, they were forced 
to flee to the shelter of Louvain. We asked the 
bishop if the worst charged at Louvain were true, 
could Belgium approach the horrors of Dro- 
gheda, Ireland, under the reign of Oliver Crom- 
well. 

Matthew Carey, a reliable historian, writes : 

Of all the cases of murderous cruelty that marked 
the career of the government in Ireland, the most 
atrocious occurred at the surrender of Drogheda. The 
history of the Huns, Vandals, Goths and Ostragoths 
may be searched in vain for anything more shocking. 

[98] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

Cromwell had besieged this town for some time, and 
was finally admitted on promise of quarter. The gar- 
rison consisted of the flower of the Irish army, and 
might have beaten him back, had they not been se- 
duced by his solemn promise of mercy, which was 
observed till the whole had laid down their arms. 
Then he commanded his soldiers to begin the slaugh- 
ter of the entire garrison, which slaughter continued 
for five days with every circumstance of brutal and 
sanguinary violence that the most cruel savages could 
conceive or perpetrate. 

Lest the above sentences may be considered 
some exaggeration, here follows an extract from 
the official report to London, signed by Oliver 
Cromwell : 

It has pleased God to bless our endeavors at Dro- 
gheda. I wish that all honest hearts may give the 
glory of this to God alone, to whom indeed the praise 
of this mercy belongs. I believe we put to the sword 
the whole number of the defenders. I do not think 
thirty of the whole number escaped with their lives, 
those that did are in safe custody for the Barbadoes. 

Broudine says that children at the breasts of 
mothers and the aged were murdered. In Wex- 
ford two thousand men, women and children were 
slaughtered in the streets of the town. 

[99] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

THE WEXFORD MASSACRE 

They knelt around the cross divine, 

The matron and the maid — 
They bow'd before redemption's sign 

And fervently they prayed — 
Three hundred fair and helpless ones, 

Whose crime was this alone — 
Their valiant husbands, sires, and sons 

Had battled for their own. 

Had battled bravely, but in vain — 

The Saxon won the fight. 
And Irish corpses strewed the plain 

Where Valor slept with Right. 
And now, that Alan of demon guilt. 

To fated Wexford flew — 
The red blood reeking on his hilt, 

Of hearts to Erin true ! 

He found them there — the young, the old — 

The maiden and the wife ; 
Their guardians, brave in death, were cold. 

Who dared for them the strife. 
They prayed for mercy — God on high 

Before they cross they prayed, 
And ruthless Cromwell bade them die 

To glut the Saxon blade ! 

Three hundred fell — the stifled prayer 
Was quenched in woman's blood; 
[ loo] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

Nor youth nor age could move to spare 

From slaughter's crimson flood. 
But nations keep a stern account 

Of deeds that tyrants do; 
• And guiltless blood to Heaven will mount 

And Heaven avenge it, too ! 

Three thousand men, women and children, of all 
ranks and ages, took refuge in the Cathedral of Cashel, 
hoping the Temple of the living God would afford 
them a sanctuary from the butcheries that were laying 
the whole country desolate. The barbarian Ireton 
forced the gates of the church, and let loose his blood- 
hounds among them, who soon convinced them how 
vain was their reliance on the temple or the altar of 
God, They were slaughtered without discrimination. 
Neither rank, dignity nor character saved the noble- 
man, the bishop or the priest ; nor decrepitude nor his 
hoary head, the venerable sage bending down into the 
grave ; nor her charms, the virgin ; nor her virtues, the 
respectable matron; nor its helplessness, the smiling 
infant. Butchery was the order of the day, and all 
shared the common fate. — Carey, p. 351. 

In the Sydney papers, London, 1746, is given 
an account of Sir Richard Cox's services in Ire- 
land, where he makes the follov^ing boast: 

As to the enemy, I used them like nettles, and 
squeezed them (I mean their vagabond partyes) soe 
hard, that they could seldom sting ; having, as I believe, 

[lOl] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

killed and hanged no less than three thousand of them, 
whilst I stayed in the County of Cork; and taken from 
them in cattle and plunder, at least to the value of 
twelve thousand pounds, which you will easily believe, 
when you know that I divided three hundred and eigh- 
ty pounds between one troop (Colonel Townsend's) 
in the beginning of August. After which Colonel 
Beecher and the western gentlemen got a prey worth 
three thousand pounds, besides several other lesser 
preys, taken by small partyes, that are not taken notice 
of &c. 

Lord Clare stated that 11,697,629 acres had 
been confiscated in Ireland, as follows: 

Forfeited up to the close of James I's reign 2,836,837 
Forfeited up to close of Charles IPs reign 7,800,000 
Forfeited at the revolution 1,060,792 



Total 11,697,629 

So that the whole of our island has been confiscated, 
with the exception of the estates of five or six families 
in the reign of Henry VIII, who recovered their pos- 
sessions before Tyrone's rebellion and had the good 
fortune to escape the pillage of the English republic 
inflicted by Cromwell; and no inconsiderable portion 
of the Island had been confiscated twice, or perhaps 
thrice, in the course of the century. . . . The situa- 
tion, therefore, of the Irish nation at the revolution, 
stands unparalleled in the history of the inhabited 
world. 

[ 102] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

The writer thought it more than passing 
strange in the islands of the West Indies to find 
black, brown and yellow men with such pro- 
nounced Celtic names as O'Brien, Brady, Mc- 
Carthy and O'Neil, many of them speaking only 
the Spanish or mixed native tongues, only to 
learn they were descendants of expatriated Irish, 
sent to the West Indies as slaves by the English, 
and, as the stock had run out, gradually took up 
with and married the native women of mixed 
bloods. During the Cromwellian period a hun- 
dred thousand and more Irish children were 
taken from their parents, put in chains and trans- 
ported in the fetid holes of slave ships to labor 
as slaves on the tropical plantations of the Eng- 
lish West Indian colonists. Thirty thousand 
were sold to the American colonists. Stations 
were established in Ireland where these unfortu- 
nates were confined before being sold into 
slavery. 

Ireland must have exhibited scenes in every 
part like the slave hunts in Africa. How many 
girls of gentle birth must have been caught and 
hurried to the private prisons of these men- 
catchers none can tell. We are told of one case. 
Daniel Connery, a gentleman of Clare, was sen- 

[ 103] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

tenced, in Morrison's presence, to banishment, in 
1657, by Colonel Henry Ingoldsby, for harboring 
a priest. "This gentleman had a wife and twelve 
children. His wife fell sick and died in poverty. 
Three of his daughters, beautiful girls, were 
transferred to the West Indies, to an island called 
the Barbadoes; and there, if still alive (he says), 
they are miserable slaves." 

In 1653 slave contracts to supply Irish girls 
were entered into by English army officers. 
Cromwell suggested that boys between the ages 
of twelve and fourteen be seized. A contract was 
made for 1,000 boys and 1,000 slave girls to be 
transported from Galway in October, 1655. 

No age was spared, no sex, no degree; 
Nor infants in the porch of life were free; 
The sick, the old, who could but hope a day. 

Thomas Addis Emmet, one of the most careful 
of historians, states "to kill an Irishman on sight 
was not unlawful." 

THE TREATY OF LIMERICK 

The writer stood near the Treaty Stone of Lim- 
erick early one morning in September last listen- 
ing to some market men denouncing the Germans 
for the violation of the treaty with Belgium. 

[ 104] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

History must either deny or justify the contention 
of Germany that the march across the Belgian 
frontier was rendered necessary by conditions 
which are being discussed at present in the heat 
of awful passion, and, in the opinion of the writer, 
the hour has not come to argue the case with the 
spirit or intelligence necessary to form a fair 
judgment. But the broken Treaty of Limerick 
is a frightful historic fact, and there in the heart 
of the city, close to the beautiful flowing river 
Shannon, stands the memorial, and lodged on 
the uppermost square of the structure is the stone. 
The inscription reads: 

The Treaty of Limerick 
Signed A.D. 1681 

The other monument in Limerick is the statue 
of General Patrick Sarsfield, one of the great 
heroes of Ireland and foremost soldiers of 
Europe. Ireland, unfortunately, had taken the 
side of the weak King James, who was defeated 
by King William, a native of Holland, who spoke 
no English. The last fighting man in Ireland to 
face the great Dutch warrior, whose fame is 
second only to Napoleon Bonaparte, was the in- 
comparable Sarsfield, who held out at Limerick 

[105] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

to the last, long after King James had fled, after 
his overthrow at the battle of the Boyne, which 
was fought for some days, and decided on July 12, 
1690 (Orangeman's Day), a circumstance which 
has exercised a most powerful effect on the course 
of Irish history for two centuries. There was 
only one general in Ireland worthy to cope with 
the Dutch king, say the military critics, and that 
man was Sarsfield; but James, being a king, 
wished to have the engagement fought under his 
leadership, and lost. 

After King James fled to France, the gallant 
regiments of Sarsfield fought on and refused to 
yield to superior forces. The French, under 
Lauzan, deserted Sarsfield at Limerick, where he 
was besieged while King William destroyed the 
country surrounding Limerick. Sarsfield, in the 
night, led his troops out over Thomond Bridge, 
crossed the Shannon at Killaloe, and won a vic- 
tory. The battle lasted several days, and the 
English forces retreated. The women fought 
under Sarsfield with great intrepidity. King 
William retreated to Clonmel, and left for Eng- 
land, from Dungannon, leaving the army in Ire- 
land in charge of Ginkell. The French again de- 
serted Sarsfield and embarked for France. Gin- 

[io6] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

kell, with a great army, besieged Limerick, which 
Sarsfield defended for seven months. Finally, 
Ginkell, who was anxious to end the war, and 
Sarsfield, being alone, although holding the city, 
signed the celebrated Treaty of Limerick on 
October 3, 169L Just then the French fleet 
arrived in the Shannon River with an army and 
navy sufficient, with Sarsfield, to defeat the Eng- 
lish. But the gallant hero refused to break the 
treaty, despite the entreaties of his officers. He 
ordered his army to the Continent, as agreed, 
where he died on the battlefield of Landen, lead- 
ing a famous charge at the head of the Irish 
Brigade at the moment of victory. 

The Treaty of Limerick guaranteed civil and 
religious liberty, and was a sort of a Magna 
Charta for Ireland. The treaty was quickly vio- 
lated, proscription followed, 2,000,000 acres of 
land was confiscated, and the trade and commerce 
of the island transferred by law to England. The 
violated Treaty of Limerick was followed by all 
the horrors of the Penal Days, as well as the 
period of greatest decay in Irish commerce and 
industry. No English historian has endeavored 
to justify the breaking of Limerick's historic 
treaty, 

[107] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

LEST WE FORGET 

The Irish people are anxious for fear the Ger- 
man aircraft will hover over Ireland and drop 
bombs on the towns. Sir Edward Carson of 
Ulster warns the people of Ireland to beware of 
the certainty of attacks from the skies. We are 
in position to state that assurances have been re- 
ceived from the German Government that it is 
not its present intention to attack Ireland from 
the air. After England has been subjugated and 
conquered the Germans will take over Ireland 
and make of it a free nation. 

The Irish press denounces the Germans in un- 
measured terms for dropping bombs on the unde- 
fended English towns. The same newspapers 
praised the English aeroplane fliers, earlier in the 
war, who dropped bombs on German fishing vil- 
lages on the way to the German naval base. They 
have approved the daring French aviators drop- 
ping bombs on undefended German towns. They 
seem to have forgotten the fact that the French 
airmen dropped bombs on the undefended Ger- 
man town of Niirnherg even before war was de- 
clared. The Germans are merely retaliating with 
their Zeppelins and other aircraft by attacking 
coast and arsenal towns containing munitions of 
war, wireless stations, coast artillery, barracks, 

[io8] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

and places believed to be occupied by soldiers. Of 
course, this murderous art of modern warfare on 
both sides causes one to shudder, but the Allies 
began it and are now paying the severer penalty 
because of the greater skill of the German airmen. 
When the English soldiers in 1814 destroyed 
Washington, the American capital, applying the 
torch to the national capital buildings, burning 
the White House, the home of the President, and 
fired the newspaper plants, there was much 
righteous indignation. 

Green's "History of England" states that this 
work of vandalism was pursued under strict 
orders from the British Government. 

"Willingly," said the London Statesman, 
"would we throw a veil of oblivion over our 
transactions at Washington. The Cossacks 
spared Paris, but we spared not the capital of 
America." 

(From the New York World, January 28, 1915.) 

INQUIRY IN BRITAIN FINDS NO OUTRAGES 
DONE TO BELGIANS 

THOUSANDS OF CHARGES MADE AGAINST GERMANS IN- 
VESTIGATED BY GOVERNMENT AND FOUND BASELESS 

Washington, January 27. — Of the thousands of 
Belgian refugees who are now in England not one has 
been subjected to atrocities by German soldiers. 

[ 109] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

This, in effect, is the substance of a report received 
at the State Department from the American Embassy 
in London, The report states that the British Govern- 
ment thoroughly had investigated thousands of reports 
to the effect that German soldiers had perpetrated out- 
rages on the fleeing Belgians. 

During the early period of the war columns of 
British newspapers were filled with the accusations. 

Agents of the British Government, according to the 
report from the American Embassy at London, care- 
fully investigated all of these charges; they inter- 
viewed the alleged victims and sifted all the evidence. 

As a result of the investigation the British Foreign 
Office notified the American Embassy that the charges 
appeared to be based upon hysteria and natural preju- 
dice. The report added that many of the Belgians 
had suffered severe hardships, but they should be 
charged up against the exigencies of war rather than 
the brutality of the individual German soldiers. 



[no] 



CHAPTER XI 

THE IRISH HOME RULE BILL 

"Mockery of Irish Independence is not what 
we want. The bauble of a powerless Parlia- 
ment does not lure us." — Thomas Davis. 

"The people never give up their liberties but 
under some delusion.'' — Edmund Burke. 

The present writer has in his possession one 
of the few copies of the Home Rule measure 
signed by the King, subject to Ulster amendments 
and the partition of Ireland along newly marked 
religious lines, the whole shaky structure to be 
held back until after the settlement of the war, 
and offered now as a legislative recruiting bait 
to catch soldiers. 

The most widely circulated newspaper in Ire- 
land is the Dublin Freeman's Journal, the chief 
organ of Leader John Redmond. A recent issue 
(November 21st) continues to publish the most 
startling stories of "German Atrocities," known 
to be false on this side, but designed to help re- 
cruiting. Here are a few of the scare headlines : 

[III] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 
MURDER AND RAPINE. 

GERMAN'S WARFARE ON THE 
DEFENCELESS. 

GERMAN SAVAGES. 

DEVILS AND BEASTS. 

"The first Prussian soldier that lands in Ire- 
land will be the public executioner, etc." Edi- 
torially, the paper bemoans the failure of Irish 
exports last year and says that Ireland's economic 
path is the reverse of any other country, and 
that Ireland alone, among European countries, 
has an excess of food exports over manufactures. 
Of course, having no industries to enable wage- 
workers to eat the products of Irish farms, the 
surplus must be exported. Could Germany do 
worse? 

I was surprised in Ireland this fall to find many 
farmers in the south of Ireland opposed to the 
Home Rule Bill, solely on the ground that their 
taxes would be increased by the army of office- 
holders created under the local government. As 
there are few factories, outside of three counties, 
it follows that the burden of carrying the new 

[112] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

government must fall on the farmers. And, 
with an amended bill, which Mr. Redmond agreed 
to accept last spring in conference, eliminating 
the chief industrial boroughs of Ulster from the 
act, the farmers would be further burdened by 
the office-holding class living off the rates col- 
lected from the poor districts. The great manu- 
facturing cities of the United States, to a con- 
siderable extent, relieve the farmer from exces- 
sive state, often county, and national taxation, 
because of the heavy assessments placed on fac- 
tory property, or stock and bonds relating to it. 
Agricultural laborers are the poorest paid class 
of laborers, and have no money to spare beyond 
the bare subsistence from the land. The factory 
worker is often a skilled wage-earner, and it is 
this class only, unknown to most of Ireland, who 
can insure the prosperity of a nation. An Irish 
manufacturing world would not only furnish the 
farmer with a home market for his products, but 
would furnish a steady guarantee of good prices 
so the farmer would have more money for his 
family. The nearest to the best known condition 
of prosperity is where a country supplies diversi- 
fied manufacture, commerce and agriculture. 
When Ireland relied solely on the potato for 

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THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

life, the black blight of famine swept over the 
land, and millions died from starvation, the 
plague, or fled the country. 

THE TERMS OF THE HOME RULE BILL 

The text of the opening clause of the Home 
Rule Bill follows: 

A bill to amend the provision for the government 
of Ireland. 

Be it enacted by the King's most excellent Majesty, 
by and with the advice and consent of the Lord's spir- 
itual and temporal and Commons in this present Par- 
liament assembled and by the authority of the same, 
as follows: 

LEGISLATIVE AUTHORITY 

1. On and after the appointed day there shall be in 
Ireland an Irish Parliament consisting of His Majesty 
the King and two houses, namely, the Irish Senate and 
the Irish House of Commons. 

2. Notwithstanding the establishment of the Irish 
Parliament or anything contained in this Act, the 
supreme power and authority of the Parliament of 
the United Kingdom shall remain unaffected and un- 
diminished o'er all persons, matters and things within 
His Majesty's dominions. 

The Irish Parliament shall not have power to make 
laws in respect of the following matters, in particular, 
or any of them, namely : 

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THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

I. The Crown, or the succession to the Crown, or a 
Regency or the Lord Lieutenant, except as respects the 
exercise of his executive power in relation to Irish 
services as defined for the purposes of this Act. Or 
(2) The making of peace or war or matters arising 
from a state of war or the regulation of the conduct 
or any portion of His Majesty's subjects during the 
existence of hostilities between foreign states with 
which His Majesty is at peace in relation to those hos- 
tilities; or (3) the navy, the army, the territorial force 
or any other naval or military force or the defence of 
the realm, or any other naval or military matter; or 
(4) treaties of any relations with foreign states or 
relations with other parts of His Majesty's Dominions, 
or offences connected with any such treaties, or rela- 
tions, or procedure connected with the extradition of 
criminals under any treaty, or the return of fugitive 
offenders from or to any part of His Majesty's Do- 
minions; or (5) dignities or titles of honor; or (6) 
treason, felony, alienage naturalization, or aliens as 
such; or (7) trade with any place out of Ireland (ex- 
cept so far as trade may be affected by the exercise of 
the powers of taxation given to the Irish Parliament, 
or by the regulation of importation for the sole pur- 
pose of preventing contagious disease). Quarantine or 
navigation, including merchant shipping (except as 
respects inland waters and local health or harbor reg- 
ulations) ; or (8) lighthouses, buoys or beacons (ex- 
cept so far as they can consistently with any general 
Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom be con- 
structed or maintained by a local harbor authority) ; 

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THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

or (9) coinage, legal tender, or any change in the 
standard of weights and measures; or (10) trade- 
marks, designs, merchandise marks, copyright or pat- 
ent rights; or (11) any of the following matters (in 
this Act referred to as reserved matters), namely: (a) 
the general subject matter of the Acts relating to land 
purchase in Ireland; the Old Age Pensions Acts, 1908 
and 191 1 ; the National Insurance Act, 191 1 ; and the 
Labor Exchanges Act, 1909; (b) the collection of 
taxes; (c) the Royal Irish Constabulary, and the man- 
agement and control of that force; (d) Post Office 
Savings Banks, Trustee Savings Banks, and friendly 
societies; and (e) public loans made in Ireland before 
the passing of this Act, provided that the limitation on 
the powers of the Irish Parliament under this section 
shall cease as respects any such reserved matter if the 
corresponding reserved service is transferred to the 
Irish Government under the provisions of this Act. 
Any law made in contravention of the limitations im- 
posed by this section shall so far as it contravenes 
those limitations be void. 

EXECUTIVE AUTHORITY 

Clause 4. — (i) The Executive power in Ireland 
shall continue vested in His Majesty the King, and 
nothing in this Act shall affect the exercise of that 
power, except as respects Irish services as defined for 
the purposes of this Act. (2) As respects those Irish 
services the Lord Lieutenant or other chief executive 
officer or officers for the time being appointed in his 
place on behalf of His Majesty, shall exercise any pre- 

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THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

rogative or other executive power of His Majesty, the 
exercise of which may be delegated to him by His Maj- 
esty. (3) The power so delegated shall be exercised 
through such Irish departments as may be established 
by Irish Act or subject thereto by the Lord Lieuten- 
ant and the Lord Lieutenant may appoint officers to 
administer those departments, and those officers shall 
hold office during the pleasure of the Lord Lieutenant. 
(4) The persons who are for the time being heads of 
such Irish departments as may be determined by Irish 
Act or in the absence of any such determination by the 
Lord Lieutenant and such other persons (if any) as 
the Lord Lieutenant may appoint, shall be the Irish 
Ministers. 

IRISH PARLIAMENT 

1. There shall be a session of the Irish Parliament 
once at least in every year. 

2. The Lord Lieutenant shall in His Majesty's name 
summon and prorogue and dissolve the Irish Parlia- 
ment. 

7. The Lord Lieutenant shall give or withhold the 
consent of His Majesty to bills passed by the two 
Houses of the Irish Parliament, subject to the follow- 
ing limitations, namely: (i) He shall comply with 
any instructions given by His Majesty the King in re- 
spect of any such bill; and (2) he shall, if so directed 
by the King, postpone giving the assent of His Maj- 
esty to any such bill presented to him for assent for 
such period as His Majesty may direct. 

Clause 8. — Part i. The Irish Senate shall consist of 

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THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

forty senators, nominated as respects the first senators 
by the Lord Lieutenant, subject to any instructions 
given by His Majesty in respect of the nominations, 
and afterward by the Lord Lieutenant on the advice 
of the Executive Committee. The term of office of 
each senator shall be eight years. Vacancies in the 
Senate to be filled by the Lord Lieutenant. 

The Irish House of Commons shall consist of 164 
members, returned by the constituencies of Ireland. 

AN ATTENUATED MEASURE 

The act is more surprising in what it estops 
Ireland from doing than for any great meas- 
ures of legislative relief whereby a nation is 
made healthy and enduring in the economic sense. 

The representation of Ireland in the British 
House of Commons is cut down from 105 to 42. 
As the principal power over Ireland is still in- 
vested in the British House of Commons, the re- 
duction will seriously affect the influence of the 
Irish members at London. The changes for the 
good of Ireland are briefly as follows: 

An Irish treasury and fund is created which 
collects the proceeds of all taxes levied in Ire- 
land. All local taxation is handled by the new 
administration. The Irish Parliament cannot 
change the tariffs on exports or imports, but can 

[118] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

control and rearrange its internal finances, sub- 
ject, of course, to the veto of the nominated Sen- 
ate and the King. Irish control is given to all 
purely local improvements. Various funds, now 
managed in London, are transferred to Ireland, 
the money to be disbursed by joint exchequer 
boards. The Irish Government can make loans 
without going to London. 

PROVISIONS AS TO JUDICIAL POWER 

Clause 2y — A Judge of the Supreme Court or other 
Superior Court in Ireland, or of any County Court, or 
other Court with a like jurisdiction in Ireland, ap- 
pointed after the passing of this Act, shall be appointed 
by the Lord Lieutenant and shall hold his office by the 
same tenure as that by which the office is held at the 
time of the passing of this Act, with the substitution 
of an address from both Houses of the Irish Parlia- 
ment for an address from both Houses of the Parlia- 
ment of the United Kingdom, and during his continu- 
ance in office his salary shall not be diminished or his 
right to pension altered without his consent. 

Clause 28. — (i) The appeal from Courts in Ire- 
land to the House of Lords shall cease, and where any 
person would but for this Act have a right to appeal 
from any Court in the land to the House of Lords, that 
person shall have the like right to appeal to His Maj- 
esty in Council, and all enactments relating to His 

[119] 



THE KING. THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

Majesty the King in Council and to the judicial com- 
mittee of the Privy Council shall apply accordingly. 
(2) When judicial committee sit for hearing any ap- 
peal from a Court in Ireland, in pursuance of any pro- 
visions of this Act, there shall be present not less than 
four Lords of Appeal within the meaning of the Ap- 
pellate Jurisdiction Act, 1876, and at least one member 
who is or has been a Judge of the Supreme Court in 
Ireland. (3) A rota of Privy Councillors to sit for 
hearing Appeals from Courts in Ireland shall be made 
annually by His Majesty in council and the Privy 
Councillors or some of them on that rota shall sit to 
hear the said appeals. A casual vacancy occurring in 
the rota during the year may be filled by Order in 
Council. (4) Nothing in this Act shall affect the 
jurisdiction of the House of Lords to determine the 
claim to Irish Peerages. 

Clause 30. — (i) Where any decision of the Court 
of Appeal in Ireland involves the decision of any 
question as to the validity of any law made in the Irish 
Parliament and the decisions not otherwise subject to 
an appeal to His Majesty the King in council, an ap- 
peal shall lie to His Majesty the King in council by 
virtue of this section, but only by leave of the Court 
of Appeal or His Majesty. (2) Where any decision 
of a Court in Ireland involves the decision of any ques- 
tion as to the validity of any law made by the Irish 
Parliament, and the decision is not subject to any ap- 
peal to the Court of Appeal in Ireland, as appeal shall 

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THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

lie to the Court of Appeal in Ireland by virtue of this 
section. 

Clause 31. — (i) Notwithstanding anything to the 
contrary in any Act, every subject of His Majesty shall 
be qualified to hold the office of Lord Lieutenant of 
Ireland without reference to his religious belief. (2) 
The term of office of the Lord Lieutenant shall be 
six years without prejudice to the power of His Maj- 
esty at any time to revoke the appointment. (3) 
The salary and expenses of the Lord Lieutenant shall 
be paid out of moneys provided by the Parliament of 
the United Kingdom, but there shall be deducted from 
the transferred sum in each year toward the payment 
of the Lord Lieutenant's salary a sum of £5,000. 

All existing British officials in the Civil Service of 
Ireland are continued in office, but the Irish adminis- 
tration can create new offices for departments in the 
new bill, not hitherto organized. The Irish Parlia- 
ment shall have no control over the police or constab- 
ulary for at least six years. It is up to t"he King to 
decide whether he shall turn over the government 
buildings in Ireland to the Irish Government. 

POWERS OF VARYING TAXATION 

The bill confers on the Irish Parliament the 
following financial powers: 

I. It may add to the rate of excise duties, customs 
duties on beer and spirits, stamp duties (with certain 
exceptions). 

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THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

2. It may add to an extent not exceeding ten per 
cent, to the income tax, death duties, or customs du- 
ties other than the duties on beer and spirits imposed 
by the Imperial ParHament. 

3. It may levy any new taxes other than new cus- 
toms duties. 

4. It may reduce any tax levied in Ireland with the 
exception of certain stamp duties, etc. 

The Imperial Treasury will collect the revenue 
arising from any increases in taxation enacted by 
the Irish Parliament in the exercise of those 
powers and an addition will be made to the trans- 
ferred sum of such amount as the Joint Ex- 
chequer Board may determine to be the produce 
of the additional taxation. Similarly if taxation 
is reduced by the Irish Parliament a deduction 
will be made from the transferred sum corre- 
sponding to the loss of revenue due to the repeal 
of a tax or to the collection at the lower rates. 
The Irish Exchequer will, therefore, gain or lose 
by any increase or decrease in taxation enacted 
by the Irish Parliament, but the net revenue of 
the Imperial Exchequer will remain unaffected 
by such changes. 

If excise or customs duties are imposed at dif- 
[ 122] 



THE KING. THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

ferent rates in Great Britain and Ireland, re- 
spectively, provision is made for the adjustment 
of taxes paid in respect of articles passing from 
one country to the other. As administrative dif- 
ficulties might arise in certain cases if the ten 
per cent, limitation mentioned above were in 
terms to prohibit additions to the taxes in ques- 
tion to an extent of more than ten per cent, of 
the normal tax, the bill effects the object in view- 
by enacting that only such proceeds of the tax 
as do not exceed ten per cent, of the yield of the 
imperial tax shall be transferred to the Irish Ex- 
chequer. The bill makes no specific reference to 
the powers of the Imperial Parliament to levy 
taxation in Ireland. The provision in Clause 1 
that the supreme power and authority of the 
Parliament of the United Kingdom shall remain 
with the existing powers of the Imperial Parlia- 
ment rules in this regard. 

The governmental revenues of Ireland are 
scarcely above $54,000,000. The Home Rule 
Bill will give financial control to the Irish admin- 
istration of about $35,000,000. The best esti- 
mate in Ireland is that about 1,400 ofBces will be 
created under the act, which will be given to the 
present followers of the politicians in control of 

[ 123] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

the Parliamentary Party. The increase in taxa- 
tion can only come out of excise taxes or raising 
the value of land, as Ireland, or that portion of 
it included in the act, has few manufactures. 
There is no hope for an industrial revival through 
an act which expressly prohibits Ireland from 
having any control whatsoever over foreign 
trade, treason, aliens, quarantine, navigation, 
lighthouses, coinage, legal tender, trade-marks, 
patent rights, police, banks, or merchant shipping. 
But will this attenuated and disappointing 
measure be finally adopted after all? (1) The 
Conservative Party in England have declared 
that their opposition is in no way abated. (2) 
The Ulster Unionists have renewed their cove- 
nant against any form of Home Rule. The Ul- 
ster Unionists are powerful, because they are 
backed by the whole of the conservative and aris- 
tocratic forces in England. In addition to this 
normal backing, they have now put the Liberal 
authors of the Home Rule measure under obli- 
gations to them. The Ulster leaders have handed 
their volunteers with their arms to the British 
War Office. They must have been given some 
assurances before they did this. The assurances 
that the Ulster Unionist leaders would ask 

[ 124] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

would be that the Home Rule measure should be 
allowed to remain a dead letter.* 

*Professor Robert Ellis Thompson, of Pennsylvania, is one 
of the most noted of American political economists. He says 
that "Ireland is in the best position possible for protesting 
against the whole system, of which she has been the most con- 
spicuous victim. Some of her American friends plead that Eng- 
land has been so good to her that she owes to the British 
Empire the utmost exertion in the present crisis. They point 
to the concession of Home Rule as binding the country to per- 
petual loyalty. 

"They do not seem to be aware that any self-governing colony 
of the empire, not excepting the Boers, who were fighting Great 
Britain so recently, enjoys far more Home Rule than the new 
legislation will secure to Ireland. They all have in their hands 
the fiscal legislation, which enables them to secure the pros- 
perity of their people by developing their industry. Ireland is 
denied this most strictly, and is left still dependent upon the 
fruits of her agriculture, with the certainty of famine whenever 
the crops fail. 

"They remind us that Ireland gets a larger share of the old 
age pensions than either England or Scotland. They forget that 
the poverty of Ireland, caused by the destruction of her manu- 
factures, has driven and is driving out so many of her able- 
bodied people, as to make the proportion of aged people in the 
census far greater than in any other country of the world. They 
speak reproachfully of the scanty response to English recruiting 
for the war. Do they expect Ireland to deplete her scanty popu- 
lation of military age by sending out for England the soldiers 
the latter cannot enlist at home?" 



[125] 



CHAPTER XII 

OUR INTERFERENCE IN IRELAND 

John Redmond is the chosen leader of the Irish 
Nationalist Party — that is, of the political group 
which alone can speak and act for Ireland. The 
Irish people are the best judges of the war situa- 
tion in their own land. They have to live in Ire- 
land. What business have persons of Irish 
blood, citizens of other countries, to be giving 
gratuitous advice to the people at home, who re- 
sent all this outside interference and are able to 
decide what is best for themselves? This is the 
view taken by most Americans. To the average 
man this view of Ireland seems the only sane and 
sensible one. He is surprised, therefore, that any 
considerable number of American citizens are 
found interfering with the will of the Irish 
Parliamentary Party; and, knowing little of the 
history of Ireland, our average friends become 
impatient with our singular attitude, and advise 
us to mind our own business, adding, if the Irish 
want to follow Redmond's appeal for troops and 
go off to the Continent and get killed and wounded 

[126] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

for the British Empire, let them go — it is none 
of our affair. 

This argument would be most effective and un- 
answerable if made to any race in the world other 
than the Irish. If the Germans or the French in 
America were advising their brothers in the old 
land not to fight for their country, they would 
present a spectacle which would cause general 
criticism and resentment. They would not dream 
of making such a protest. They take no active 
part in the affairs of the country from whence 
they emigrated, and their interest is merely 
sentimental. 

The Irish race presents a unique and isolated 
position. It is the one nation in the world where 
for every one of its sons living in Ireland at least 
five live in some other country. There are more 
persons of Irish blood in New York, Boston, 
Philadelphia and Chicago than any city in Ire- 
land. There are nearly as many Irish in Liver- 
pool or Melbourne as in Dublin or Belfast. 
Marcus Daly of Butte, great copper mine owner, 
once remarked that the Irish of Montana pos- 
sessed more wealth than two of four provinces 
in Ireland. 

The Southern Cross of Buenos Ayres, Argen- 
[ 127] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

tine Republic, an Irish paper, contains more col- 
umns of advertising than any newspaper in Ire- 
land. There are many newspapers in America 
which specialize in Irish news. Some of them 
have managed to get along for many years with- 
out having to furnish any other class of news. 
Others publish an Irish page or two of news from 
the various counties in Ireland. In each diocese 
there are Catholic papers, and the majority of 
them give space to Irish affairs. The Irish so- 
cieties are numerous, some of them wealthy, and 
they keep alive the patriotic spirit. They hold 
thousands of meetings, outside of Ireland, to re- 
new the memories of great anniversary days — 
Robert Emmet, the Manchester martyrs, Wolfe 
Tone, Thomas Moore, and others. And they 
have practically, by common consent, made the 
birth of Saint Patrick a national holiday in the 
United States. 

The true Irish exiles, transplanted to lands of 
freedom, long to see Ireland a free nation. They 
know they can succeed and do succeed in com- 
merce and industry everywhere in the world out- 
side of Ireland. The spirit of freedom has pre- 
served the homogeneity of the Celts, and the eter- 
nal principle of liberty is the keynote for all im- 

[128] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

portant Irish-American societies, celebrations, 
newspapers, and dramas, and they seem able to 
hand down that spirit through three and four 
generations. Make of Erin a mere West British 
dependency and you have destroyed the soul and 
spirit of the movement which has been inspired 
by the love and faith of the emigrants. 

LAMENT OF THE IRISH EMIGRANT 

I'm sittin' on the stile, Mary, 

Where we sat side by side 
On a bright May mornin' long ago, 

When first you were my bride. 
The corn was springin' fresh and green. 

The lark sang loud and high. 
And the red was on your lip, Mary, 

And the love-light in your eye. 

The place is little changed, Mary, 

The sky is bright as then, 
The lark's loud song is in my ear 

And the corn is green again ; 
But I miss the soft clasp of your hand, 

And your breath warm on my cheek. 
And I still keep listening for the words 

You never more will speak. 

'Tis but a step down yonder lane. 
And the little church stands near, — 
[129] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

The church where we were wed, Mary, — 

I see the spire from here. 
But the graveyard Hes between, Mary, 

And my step might break your rest, — 
For I've laid you, darling, down to sleep, 

With your baby on your breast. 

I'm very lonely now, Mary, 

For the poor make no new friends, 
But, O, they love the better still 

The few our Father sends ! 
And you were all I had, Mary, 

My blessin' and my pFide ; 
There's nothing left to care for now. 

Since my poor Mary died. 

Yours was the good, brave heart, Mary, 

That still kept hoping on, 
When the trust in God had left my soul. 

And my arm's young strength was gone ; 
There was comfort ever in your lip, 

And the kind look on your brow, — 
I bless you, Mary, for that same, 

Though you cannot hear me now. 

I thank you for the patient smile, 

When your heart was fit to break, 
When the hunger pain was gnawin' there, 

And you hid it for my sake ! 
I bless you for the pleasant word 

When your heart was sad and sore, — 
[ 130] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

O, I'm thankful you are gone, Mary, 
Where grief can't reach you more! 

I'm biddin' you a long farewell, 

My Mary kind and true; 
But I'll not forget you, darlin', 

In the land I'm goin' to. 
They say there's bread and work for all, 

And the sun shines always there, 
But I'll not forget old Ireland, 

Were it fifty times as fair. 

And often in those grand old woods, 

I'll sit and shut my eyes, 
And my heart will travel back again 

To the place where Mary lies ; 
And I'll think I see the little stile 

Where we sat side by side, 
And the springin' corn, and bright May morn, 

When first you were my bride. 

As the expatriated sons of Ireland found 
refuge in the four quarters of the globe, among 
them were many men and women of genius, their 
thoughts turned to the land of their hope and 
sorrows, and they are the men who have made 
possible every reform secured by agitation, and 
no important social betterment ever comes with- 
out ceaseless agitation. There are no "Scotch" 

[131] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

or "Welsh" members of Parliament, but there is 
an Irish Nationalist Party of seventy or more. 
And there could not possibly have existed a purely 
Irish party without the moral and practical as- 
sistance of patriotic men and women in various 
parts of the world. Irish freedom and liberty 
means something more to us than mere senti- 
ment and pride. No material or individual bene- 
fit can come to any American from the success 
of the Irish cause. A number of our best men, 
with fine minds, who might well have succeeded 
in other pursuits, have become impoverished 
waiting, and watching, and working to see the 
beacon fires of freedom burning on the shores of 
the Emerald Isle. It is not the millions and millions 
of dollars sent across the seas that we regret, but 
the thing we cannot let escape our minds is the 
hideous fact that the money to save Ireland built 
up a political machine which is now crushing the 
young Irish, driving those to war who should 
have been saved for Ireland. 

America was the country which opened its 
great arms and provided a harbor of refuge for 
our exiles, and worthy adopted sons, indeed, 
many of them proved to be. 

Our friends, who know where the real work 
[ 132] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

of Irish emancipation was often started, realize 
the peculiar reasons which exist for the apparent 
interference of men and women of Irish blood 
with Redmond's plan of surrendering the youth 
of Ireland. 

Michael Davitt may be said to have founded 
the Land League which enabled the present Irish 
Party to live and exist for thirty years on a great 
issue, "the land for the people." Davitt, in 1846, 
saw his home destroyed by the English soldiers. 
He saw his father and mother starving, begging 
for bread on the streets of England. As a child 
he lost his right arm in an English factory. He 
joined the Fenian movement, was arrested in 
1870, convicted on the evidence of an informer — 
Corydon — and sentenced to fifteen years at hard 
labor. He was released in 1877, came to the 
United States the next year and settled in Brook- 
lyn, where he and Mr. John Devoy laid out 
the plan for the land movement, which brought 
into being thousands of branches of the Land 
League in various parts of the world and saved 
the Irish national movement. Without the aid 
of several millions of dollars from America and 
a world-wide propaganda, the British Govern- 
ment would have suppressed the League and the 

[133] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

landlords would still be in possession of the land. 
All this vast supply of energy, time, money, press 
and organization has been given to make Ireland 
free, and mostly by agencies outside of Ireland; 
hence, the feeling of horror to see the cause be- 
trayed that the British Empire may be saved to 
exploit Ireland further. 



[134] 



CHAPTER XIII 

ENGLISH SOCIETY TEMPTS IRISH LEADERS 

American visitors to London express themselves 
in terms of amazement over the noticeable efforts 
of Irish leaders to ascend the ladder of high 
society, to become drawing-room favorites or se- 
cure the social attentions of dukes and duchesses. 
One of the "patriots" kept four Irish-American 
visitors waiting outside the House of Commons 
three hours while he was taking tea with a duchess 
and a countess. When they finally got his ear, for 
five minutes (they had come 3,000 miles), the only 
subject he could talk about was the charm and 
grace of the duchess, who had evidently patronized 
and flattered him to his bent. One of the party, 
who had contributed $6,000 to the cause of Ire- 
land, was so disgusted with that leader that he 
withdrew from the movement on his return to 
America. Not a word was said by the member on 
the subject of Irish progress. 

An Irish speech in a London drawing-room is 
a gentle, cooing, purring sort of an address, fit 
only for mollycoddles to hear, and positively 

[135] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

painful and humiliating to real Nationalists. The 
ladies of the nobility stare through their lorg- 
nettes at the Irish member of Parliament as 
though he were some curious specimen of the 
human animal, and as he delivers himself of cer- 
tain harmless generalities that are not in dispute, 
the ladies applaud and compliment the orator on 
his charming grace and tact. During the past 
decade the Irish "patriot" was sure of vying with 
the Indian princes or the blacks from Africa as a 
social top liner, and "my lady's receptions" in the 
London social season are considered incomplete 
without an "Irishman." Of course, the blooded 
aristocrats privately view them as interlopers, 
and secretly detest them as "social climbers and 
bounders," but tolerate their presence in the 
drawing-room as a necessary attraction and the 
source of some little amusement for their women. 
The Irish social climber who can tell a good story 
or sing a good song may become a social lion ; but 
if he should attempt to discuss Home Rule with 
his society friends, that would be the end of his 
drawing-room career. He has children to educate 
and advance, age is telling on him, the patronage 
of the powerful and wealthy is necessary, and the 
Anglicizing of the family proceeds apace. 

[136] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

How different the roars of the Irish social lion 
on this side, when the campaign for funds is 
under way! Then it is, 'Treland must be free 
from the centre to the sea." If the British Gov- 
ernment could be destroyed by metaphors, he 
would have succeeded in a single night. The 
orator is three or four thousand miles away, the 
London newspapers publish little or no American 
news, the Irish member can tug away at the Brit- 
ish lion's tail in entire safety in Carnegie Hall, 
New York; the Academy of Music, Philadelphia; 
the Tivoli, of San Francisco, or the Auditorium, 
of Chicago, and other towns, the band playing 
'The Wearing of the Green" and "God Save Ire- 
land," and a great-hearted Irish audience waving 
the green and the red, white and blue colors, and 
the golden shekels pouring in the laps of the 
visitors to keep the party alive in Ireland. 

The greatest Irish leader in the past sixty 
years was Charles Stewart Parnell. The one su- 
premely valuable piece of English legislation, the 
Land Act, we owe to him. Parnell was an iron 
disciplinarian when in his prime. He knew cer- 
tain weaknesses of the Irish character; their de- 
sire for society, their facile success in the draw- 
ing-room, and he was aware of their temptations 

[137] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

through poverty, through convivialities, through 
their affections, their love of horses, and he 
knew that all these pleasures and successes were 
controlled by an enervated and jaded aristocracy 
seeking new sensations. Parnell established a 
rule in the Irish Party that no member should 
attend the social functions of the society set 
which rules London. This made trouble for him, 
naturally, among the wives and daughters of 
members of Parliament. His reply to this criti- 
cism was in this comment: "The very best 
party that Ireland can send to the English Parlia- 
ment will not last ten years intact. English so- 
cial influence, English suavity and English gold 
will break up any Irish combination in due time." 
And the very thing is happening to-day that this 
leader foresaw. One of the foremost American 
newspaper writers, an Irishman living in London 
for several years in close touch with the Irish 
members, remarked, "Why, those lads are Irish 
only when they are in America; they are dena- 
tionalized in London." 

The only Irishman who makes a business of 
writing on Irish topics for the American news- 
papers is a clever journalist, T. P. O'Connor, 
member of Parliament, representing one of the 

[138] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

city of Liverpool seats. His constituency is 
largely Irish, and he has been elected as an Irish 
Nationalist for thirty years. The writer spent 
a day among the Irish of Liverpool last August. 
They are extremely poor, having been landed in 
this English city after the famine, and employed 
mostly as laborers on ships and docks. O'Connor 
has long become altogether West British, and his 
v^ritings ought not to be accepted by American 
newspapers, as they give the English and not 
the Irish point of view. He is well known in Lon- 
don as a hack journalist, and for ten years past his 
tributes to the British army have been nauseat- 
ing. The four leaders of the party who are 
forcing recruiting are Redmond, Dillon, Devlin 
and O'Connor, aided by William O'Brien of 
Cork. All but Devlin are old men, dead to am- 
bition, doubtless exhausted by the long struggle, 
and ready now to surrender the lives of the young 
men of Ireland in return for a few legislative 
concessions. They follow the line of least re- 
sistance, and no longer oppose the pushing young 
politicians who wish to advance themselves in 
English society, or secure employment in the 
British civil service. 

A curious confirmation of the decadent state 
[ 139] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

to which social climbing and cringing to the aris- 
tocracy has brought the Irish Party, has just 
come to hand. The Irish Nationalists on this 
side of the Atlantic Ocean have been saying that 
at last the country was going to have its first 
viceroy under Home Rule, and he would prob- 
ably be an Irish peer recommended by an Irish 
Government. The race for the great office under 
the "Home Rule Act" is confined to two aris- 
tocrats, one the keeper of the king's stables, the 
other a polo player, both noblemen. The follow- 
ing cable dispatch appeared in the New York 
Tribune: 

FIGHT ON FOR POST OF IRISH VICEROY 

NATIONALISTS WANT EARL GRANARD, CHURCHILL 
AIDS LORD WIMBORNE 

London^ Dec. 14. — The contest between Lord 
Wimborne and Earl Granard for the post of Viceroy 
of Ireland, which Earl Aberdeen is about to resign, is 
the most exciting feature of domestic politics at the 
moment. Both already hold offices in the government, 
and it is understood that Wimborne has the strongest 
pull with the Cabinet. Winston Churchill is using all 
his efforts to secure the office for his first cousin. 

Granard finds his main support among the Irish 
Nationalists, who do not care overmuch for Churchill 

[140] 



THE KING, THE PCAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

or his relatives and think that the appointment of 
Granard, an Irishman, first Viceroy under Home Rule 
would be appropriate and desirable. Granard's other 
chief source of strength is from the Court, where, as 
master of the horse, he has made himself very popular, 
and although in theory the Court does not interfere in 
political appointments, it can often put in a decisive 
word where there is a difficulty of choice. 

Since Wimborne has represented the Irish Govern- 
ment in the House of Lords he has found its atmos- 
phere chilling. His success with the British polo team 
in the United States was achieved under the utmost 
discouragement at the hands of the polo authorities 
here, actuated, absurd as it may appear, by political 
hostility because he was a supporter of the Home Rule 
Bill. 

Granard, as a Catholic, has been nominally disquali- 
fied from being Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, with five- 
sixths of its population Catholic, but under the Home 
Rule Bill this remnant of the penal laws has been re- 
moved. Wimborne is a Protestant, and it is contended 
in his favor that should Sir Edward Carson attempt 
to fulfil his threats of revolt in Ulster after the war 
it would be advisable that the Ulster Orangemen 
should not have the excuse of charging the King's 
representative in Ireland with religious bias, which, of 
course, they would do. 

Premier Asquith has rarely had a more awkward 
decision to make, both on personal and ministerial 
grounds. A delicate feature of the case is that the 
wives of the Cabinet ministers and leading ladies of 

[ 141 ] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

the Court and society are pulling every imaginable 
string on behalf of their particular candidate. It is 
possible that the Premier may find himself driven in 
self-defence to put both Wimborne and Granard aside 
and select some compromise candidate. 

Lord Wimborne, the Englishman, has been 
given the high office in preference to the tw^o 
Irish peers who have been writing for it — Lords 
Fingall and Granard. The outgoing viceroy, 
Lord Aberdeen, has had the bad taste to lay 
claim to an almost sacred title. He wishes to 
be known as Marquis of Aberdeen and Tara. 
Tara was the seat of the high kings of Ireland 
from pre-Christian times. These kings — "em- 
perors of the Scots" or "Gaels" ('Tmperator 
Scotorum") — were always known as kings of 
Tara. Hence, all Irish Nationalists regard it as 
an outrage and almost a sacrilege that this ven- 
erable name should be tagged on to a British 
nobleman's title. The spectacle has excited even 
an English poet, William Watson, to write a de- 
nunciatory poem against Lord Aberdeen. It has 
been published in the London Evening News: 

TARA PROFANED 
Tara, the palace of Kings, the hill of fate! 
Tara, the throne of song, the hallowed shrine ! 
[ 142 1 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

Tagged as a tassel to your Marquisate, 

Made an appurtenance of your house and line ! 

Who cares though you were Marquis ten times o'er? 

Bemarquis'd or bedecked — who cares a straw ? 
But linked with Erin's immemorial lore, 

Her memories sacrosanct, her mount of awe ! 

Nay, why so modest ? Why so humble ? Why 
Pause in your too meek flight on Tara Hill ? 

"Marquis of Aberdeen and Sinai" — 

Consider: were not this ev'n better still? 

God made me English — English through and 
through — 

But bound to Ireland by one bond supreme. 
I know her soul — something unknown to you — 

Her vision and her passion and her dream. 

I know, as all know who have breathed her air, 
How transient, how unrooted in her heart, 

A mere ephemeral thing of passage there, 
Were you that in her glories claim a part. 

And this last insult before gazing men — 

This ignominy bitterest yet by far — 
She will remember and forgive not when 

You in Time's volume an erasure are. 

You soon enough will be by her forgot. 

Lodged in some suburb of her thoughts were you; 

[143] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

But this will as a proverb live of what 

Dull, sightless, soulless statesmanship can do. 

This profanation, blind and coarse and crude, 
Of things the holiest held from sea to sea — 

This is immortal as ineptitude; 
This is eternal as stupidity. 

And even to this from all the ages past, 

Through all the long self -torturing Ireland came: 
Left to her disillusions at the last, 

And Tara fallen a pendant to your name ! 



[144] 



CHAPTER XIV 

FOMENTING RELIGIOUS PREJUDICES 

The British Government is straining every effort 
to prejudice the Christian population of neutral 
countries against Germany. With that aim in 
view, for the first time in centuries, England has 
sent a duly accredited ambassador to the Vatican 
at Rome. The English newspapers are filled with 
the alleged important news of this mission. From 
Rome appear frequent despatches suggesting that 
the Turks are murdering Christians at various 
points and driving them out of the holy city of 
Jerusalem. The alleged ill-treatment and im- 
prisonment of the venerable Cardinal Mercier of 
Belgium has been shown to be merely an invented 
story designed to inflame Catholic opinion. The 
arrest of the venerable bishop of Lemberg in 
Poland by the Russians is not an invention, but 
little is being said about it in the press of this 
country. The lies have to some extent affected 
the Irish clergy and, to a lesser extent, are be- 
lieved by the clergymen in the United States and 
other neutral countries. A special drive along 

[H5] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

this line is being made by English publicists to 
enlist Catholic support and sympathies, as the 
Roman Catholic population in North and South 
America is fully one-half of all of the people 
on the Western Hemisphere. If English diplo- 
macy at Rome could, in any manner, secure a 
declaration from the Vatican denouncing the 
"atrocities" on the part of the Germans, the Brit- 
ish authorities figure that a proclamation of that 
significance would be worth 150,000 recruits 
and, what is even more important, give England 
the moral support of a majority of the Christian 
world, which she lacks to-day. All sensible 
Catholics should be on guard against the sinister 
news bearing Rome dating, and they should re- 
sent the British efifort to inspire hatred of Ger- 
many along religious lines. Catholics can 
hardly forget that the people of Austria-Hungary 
are nearly all Roman Catholics and that the dual 
monarchy has been the bulwark of Catholicism 
in Europe in much the same way that the Rus- 
sians have supported the Greek Orthodox 
Church. 

The Austrians have long been loyal and de- 
voted supporters of the Pope, while the head of 
the Greek Orthodox Church is the Czar of Rus- 

[146] 



THE KING, THE JCAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

sia, who now appeals to "My dear Jews" to save 
the Russian autocracy after the recent massacres 
at Kishiniff and other places. It is well known 
the present French Government is made up 
chiefly of atheists and has, practically, destroyed 
the Roman Catholic Church organization in 
France. In Germany, on the other hand, there 
exists full religious freedom and liberty, and a 
very large and devout Catholic population, fully 
two-fifths of the German people. 

A striking instance of this devotion is seen in 
a letter printed in the Koelnische Volkszeitung 
last month, from a German army chaplain, giv- 
ing an impressive description of service held for 
German soldiers in a church in France, when 
after Mass the local cure pathetically urged the 
French people to emulate the example of the sol- 
diers and return to God. The letter reads as 
follows : 

The cure of lives in a deserted castle, about fif- 
teen minutes' walk from the church. The owner of 
the castle furnished a few rooms for him when the 
church's bad patronage had been declared property of 
the state at the time church and state were separated. 

I held service in his church on Sunday. It was filled 
to overflowing. To the right sat the soldiers, with the 
officers at their head; to the left the women and chil- 

[147] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

dren of the congregation. I delivered a short sermon 
and afterward celebrated High Mass. The soldiers 
sang their German songs with such enthusiasm that it 
was a pleasure to hear them and at the end sang the 
Doxology. A great number of soldiers and their of- 
ficers received communion. The pastor and the con- 
gregation did not take their eyes away from the un- 
usual performance. After the service the soldiers 
marched out of the church solemnly. 

As I stepped into the vestry room the French priest 
looked at me in amazement. He said nothing and 
stepped before the Communion Table in order to 
announce the Masses for the following week to the 
congregation. Every Monday there was to be High 
Mass for the soldiers in the field, every Tuesday High 
Mass for those who had fallen. Then he continued, 
more loudly and with greater stress : 

"My dear parishioners, I will not keep you long to- 
day. The German soldiers preached the sermon for 
you. The Germans are our enemies, it is true. But 
a nation of men and soldiers who, with their officers 
at their head, hallow Sunday by enthusiastic songs, 
by receiving the Holy Sacrament, by their pious bear- 
ing, and who without shame or fear acknowledge their 
faith before the whole world, commands our respect 
and admiration and makes us sad when we think of 
our own present condition. 

"Poor France, once so great and now so humbled! 
No, we may not murmur nor complain because God is 
chastising France with this terrible flail of war. We 

[148] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

must patiently bear this punishment, and we must imi- 
tate the example of the German people. We must 
return to the God of our fathers ; then God will bless 
France again." 



There are many false stories circulating 
through Ireland charging the German Govern- 
ment with discriminating against Catholics and, 
in some places, actually persecuting them. These 
writers assert that the German bigots, with the 
spirit of hate in their hearts, in penetrating Bel- 
gium, deliberately destroyed convents, shrines, 
churches and sacred things. The writer received 
some letters from Ireland where people actually 
believed that the Germans murdered the Sisters 
of Charity in the hospitals and never permitted 
themselves to march past a convent without abus- 
ing and maltreating the nuns and burning the 
buildings to the ground. 

John Redmond has been the principal offender 
in this respect, often publicly charging the Ger- 
mans with being the destroyers of convents and 
churches. Therefore, the writer asked Doctor 
Dernburg for some information as to the rela- 
tions of Protestants and Catholics in Germany, 
the feeling and attitude of the government 

[H9] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

toward Roman Catholics and received the fol- 
lowing interesting reply: 

Of all the nations harboring a mixed Protestant- 
Catholic population, Germany has the largest percent- 
age of Catholics. Indeed, many parts of the country 
are nearly purely Catholic as, for instance, the old 
Archbishopric of Cologne, the Bishopric of Trier, a 
very large part of Posnania, the upper part of Silesia, 
as well as the greater part of the Kingdom of Bavaria. 
Two of the four German Kings and their houses are 
Catholic, namely the King of Bavaria and the King 
of Saxony, and if a change in the throne of Wurttem- 
berg occurs, the throne will fall to the Catholic line 
of the house of Urach. — Indeed, more than one-third 
of all Germany is Catholic, together more than 23 
million people, which corresponds to the representa- 
tion of the German Catholics in the Reichstag who 
have a party of their own called the Centre Party, 
that musters about 115 votes out of a total of 397. 

It stands to reason that in such a community the 
utmost good feeling between the members of the vari- 
ous confessions is a necessary condition for all prog- 
ress, and it has, therefore, been the aim of the Ger- 
man statesmen (out of five Chancellors, the third. 
Prince von Buelow, was a very devout Catholic and 
the wife of the fourth, Princess von Buelow, is one 
also) to secure to both confessions the utmost freedom 
and development and the greatest liberty for the exer- 
cise of their creed. The greatest noble families are 
Catholics. The Grand-Marshal at the Court of the 

[150] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

Empire, Prince Fuerstenberg, is a Catholic ; so are the 
Duke of Arenberg, Salem and Croy, and others too 
numerous to mention. 

So ever since Prince Bismarck in 1878 made a per- 
manent settlement with the Holy See, there has always 
been a perfect equality between the two confessions, 
and absolute freedom for the practice of their devo- 
tion and a perfect obliteration of all confessional lines 
as far as the government of the country is concerned. 
In Germany nobody is asked what his confession is, 
no discrimination of any kind is made, and there is no 
country in the world, on the confession of Catho- 
lics of all nations, that is more friendly and more im- 
partial than Germany. How could it be otherwise? 
In the Bavarian Ministry of nine members just one 
Protestant holds a post, and the Prime Minister has 
been the acknowledged leader of the Centre Party for 
twenty years. I state this because of the many state- 
ments that have been made that the German army has 
especially wrought destruction to Catholic convents, 
churches, schools and to the clergy, and because accu- 
sations of this nature have been made to perverters of 
public opinion in America against my Bavarian coun- 
trymen. 

Now, as I said before, Bavarians are mostly Catho- 
lics, and very devout ones too, and the invention of 
such stories show at the same time their utter falsity 
as well as the amazing ignorance of those who pretend 
to elucidate the American public. 

All those stories can be dismissed, on the evidence 
presented, as absolutely worthless, and they simply 

[151] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

prove that the effort to revile Germany in any possible 
way does not stop at the falsest inventions. 

AN ATROCITY FABLE 

The following story, an absolute "fake," ap- 
peared in numerous newspapers throughout Ire- 
land January 9, 1915: 

IRISH NUNS AT YPRES 

HOW THE BRITISH ARRIVED 

The Weekly Dispatch of Sunday published the story 
of Dame Theresa Howard, O.S.B., a niece of Mr. 
John Redmond, who went through the siege of Ypres 
with fourteen other Irish nuns at the Royal Benedic- 
tine Abbey at Ypres. The nuns are now safely lodged 
in Oulton Abbey, Staffordshire. 

The following are extracts from the diary of Dame 
Theresa: — "Oh, last night, it was awful. For a long 
time the guns went on, but in the darkness they ap- 
proached and entered — the Uhlans are upon us. 

"It is all over with Ypres ; the guns we heard all yes- 
terday were the last defence of the Belgian Army — or 
rather police — and they were only a hundred against 
fifteen hundred. They are all over the town, and the 
Burgomaster is a prisoner. What is going to happen ? 

"The German occupation was becoming more and 
more terrible. Every day brought fresh atrocities, 
and every moment we thought we were to be the next 
victims, and we would hide in the cellars for fear they 

[152] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

should see us in the convent garden or at the windows. 

"We were actually engaged in the Litanies with the 
words, 'From all evil, good Lord deliver us,' etc., each 
Sister joining in the responses, 'Good Lord, deliver 
us,' with a full soul, when we suddenly heard the 
heavy tramp, tramp of soldiers, and the sound of sing- 
ing. We trembled, thinking of the terrible Uhlans, 
answering 'God Lord, deliver us,' in their midnight 
carouse, but judge of our surprise and amazement 
when we found out that it was an English song min- 
gled with our cries of supplication, came, as it were, 
in answer, 'Here we are, here we are, here we are, 
again.' We almost joined in, but, of course, we dare 
not. But imagine the thrill of joy that went through 
our hearts. Then outside in the streets we heard the 
clamors of the populace joining in with *Alo, alo,' 
and cries of joy. W^e were just wondering in our 
Irish hearts whether or not it was an Irish regiment 
that was the first to enter, thinking of the dear old 
standard with the harp on it, of the days of the Irish 
Brigade. Suddenly we got our answer. In gruff 
brogue we heard the song which everyone seems to be 
singing everywhere, 'It's a long way to Tipperary, it's 
a long way to go.' 

"The British have come to stop. 

"The battle is raging again. Can Ypres fall again? 
Wednesday, 28th October — The German shells fell on 
the town to-day. The first fell in the sleepy moat just 
outside the ramparts. We have now to live in our 
catacombs; even the sanctuary lamp is out, and the 
chapel no longer contains the Blessed Sacrament. 

[153] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

"It was no longer possible to stop in Ypres, and so 
we determined to get under the English authorities as 
soon as possible. We each had our little parcel. 
Everything is in ruins." 

The Bavarian regiments, ninety-eight per cent. 
Catholics, accompanied by priests, were stationed 
near the Royal Benedictine Abbey near Ypres. 
The closest official investigation on the part of 
the archbishop of Cologne confirms the claim of 
the German authorities to the effect that no nun 
was harmed, all were treated respectfully by 
these really devout Bavarians, who escorted the 
Sisters to places of safety. Fancy pious Sister 
Theresa, the good niece of John Redmond, sup- 
plicating to English soldiers and being saved by 
them from the Bavarian Catholic barbarians, and 
the dear nuns listening to the White Way dis- 
trict London cockney song of "Tipperary" as a 
saving melody instead of "Adeste Fidelis." It 
is enough to make one laugh were it not for the 
horrible use in Ireland to which this outrageous 
story will be put. 

On Sunday, February 7, 1915, Cardinal Von 
Hartman, of Cologne, addressing a vast meeting 
of Catholics in the great Cathedral of Cologne, 
said: 

[154] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

The Emperor William is the foremost defender of 
Christianity. Throughout the world we no longer 
know parties. In the words of the Emperor, "we 
know only Germans." That sentiment finds an unani- 
mous echo among all Germans and our children wher- 
ever found in all sections of the world. Our people 
are as one. We are making headway in the West and 
successfully resisting invasion in the East, and God 
will never permit atheistic France, nor orthodox Rus- 
sia, nor jealous England to destroy the religious life 
of the Fatherland. We place our faith in this just 
cause. We pledge to our noble empire the intrepid 
support and unfaltering allegiance of the 26,000,000 
Catholic subjects of the German Empire, and we con- 
trast the love, regard and tolerance of the Emperor 
for our people during the past twenty-six years of his 
reign with the persecutions of the Christians in France 
and the Jews in Russia. May the Ruler of Battles, to 
whom we faithfully pray, continue to bring victories 
to the brave armies of our soldiers ! 



[155] 



CHAPTER XV 

RECRUITING THE IRISH NATIONAL VOLUNTEERS 

Ireland, having inherited nothing from Eng- 
land except sorrow and misery, is always asked 
to furnish her best blood for her exploiters 
whenever their empire is in danger. The Ro- 
mans, too, placed their slaves in the front of the 
line. Sixty years ago the Irish were forced into 
the British war against Russia, and thousands 
of them perished in Crimea. The patriots of that 
day protested, as they do to-day. Irish leaders 
then forced the poor peasants, after the famine, 
to lay down their lives for England in return for 
broken promises, in the same way and by the 
same methods that the present leaders are forc- 
ing the peasants to-day to die for a country which 
has only wronged them. 

The following street ballad of the Crimean war 
period, written by Charles J. Kickham for the 
purpose of discouraging enlistments, fits the pres- 
ent-day situation: 

[156] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

PATRICK SHEEHAN 
My name is Patrick Sheehan, 
My years are thirty-four, 
Tipperary is my native place, 
Nor far from Galtymore ; 
I came of honest parents, 
But now they're lying low, 
And many a pleasant day I spent 
In the glen of Aherlow. 

My father died : I closed his eyes 

Outside our cabin door ; 

The landlord and the sheriff, too, 

Were there the day before ; 

And there my loving mother 

And sisters three also 

Were forced to go with broken hearts 

From the glen of Aherlow. 

For three long months in search of work 

I wandered far and near; 

I went then to the poor-house 

For to see my mother dear ; 

The news I heard nigh broke my heart ; 

But still, in all my woe, 

I blessed the friends who made their graves 

In the glen of Aherlow. 

Bereft of home and kith and kin, 
With plenty all around, 
I starved within my cabin, 
And slept upon the ground. 
[157] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

But cruel as my lot was, 
I ne'er did hardship know, 
Till I joined the English army, 
Far away from Aherlow. 

"Rouse up, there," says the corporal, 

"You lazy Hirish 'ound ! 

Why don't you hear, you sleepy dog, 

The call to arms sound !" 

Alas ! I had been dreaming 

Of days long, long ago; 

I woke before Sebastopol, 

And not in Aherlow. 

I groped to find my musket. 

How dark I thought the night ! 

O, blessed God ! it was not dark. 

It was the broad daylight. 

And when I found that I was blind, 

My tears began to flow : 

I longed for even a pauper's grave 

In the glen of Aherlow. 

O blessed Virgin Mary, 

Mine is a mournful tale : 

A poor blind prisoner here I am, 

In Dublin's dreary jail, 

Struck blind within the trenches, 

Where I never feared the foe ; 

And now I'll never see again 

The glen of Aherlow. 

[158] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

A poor neglected mendicant, 

I wandered through the street ; 

My nine months' pension now being out, 

I beg from all I meet. 

As I joined my country's tyrants, 

My face I'll never show 

Among the kind old neighbors 

In the glen of Aherlow. 

Then Irish youths, dear countrymen ! 
Take heed of what I say : 
For if you join the English ranks 
You'll surely rue the day. 
And whenever you are tempted 
A soldiering to go. 
Remember poor blind Sheehan 
Of the glen of Aherlow. 

The Irish National Volunteers, organized to 
defend the cause of national Ireland, numbered, 
before the war, perhaps, 160,000 young men, the 
best physically and mentally in Ireland. They 
were organized in battalions, regiments and com- 
panies, drilled frequently, often at night, and 
went to camp. They formed the body in the Brit- 
ish Islands out of which real soldiers can be most 
quickly made. It was to them that the heads of 
the army turned eagerly, and it was to them that 
Mr. Redmond made his frantic and unpatriotic 

[159] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

appeal on behalf of the British army. Mr. Red- 
mond, until lately, refused to encourage or en- 
dorse the volunteers. In one year the body had 
grown into the most powerful and formidable 
organization in Ireland, and the old politicians 
trembled. 

In the interest of unity and harmony, and lest 
the world would consider them factionists, rather 
than have new divisions in Ireland, and in order 
to present a solid front to the Orange Tories, 
Mr. Redmond was permitted to name one-half 
of the directorate and members of the executive 
board. Ten days before the outbreak of war 
the Scottish Borderers, a regiment of the King's 
troops, had fired on an unarmed crowd in a Dub- 
lin street ; several men were killed and a number 
were injured. Ireland was in a ferment, civil 
war was threatened, and the leadership of Red- 
mond likely to close in disaster. Then the great 
war of the world broke forth Hke the fury of 
hell and the more mercurial of the Irish were 
convinced that the "German barbarian hordes" 
were at their cabin doors. Thereupon, the offi- 
cial leader of the Irish Nationalist Party, on the 
floor of the House of Commons, pledged the Irish 
National Volunteers to defend the shores of Erin 

[i6o] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

from the oncoming Teutonic hordes. To some 
extent the prestige of Mr. Redmond was restored. 
Many Celts beheved his proposition to the gov- 
ernment sounded fair and reasonable, and sup- 
ported his declaration. The Volunteers figured 
the move as one certain to bring to them neces- 
sary arms. Then followed the unexpected ap- 
pearance of the Irish leader demanding that the 
young men of Ireland, the volunteers, join the 
British army and die, not within their own shores, 
but in Belgium and in France, and under the col- 
ors of their oppressors. His best friends write 
over to this country privately and acknowledge 
his "fearful blunder," but argue that it is neces- 
sary "to save his face for the sake of the Home 
Rule Bill after the war," and adding that few 
of the Volunteers are recruiting anyway. 

Mr. Redmond and his recruiting allies are 
working to overthrow the constitution of the 
Irish Volunteers, which reads : 

1. To secure and maintain the rights and lib- 
erties of all the people of Ireland. 

2. To train, discipline and equip for this pur- 
pose an Irish volunteer force. 

3. To unite in the service of Ireland the men 
of every creed, party and class. 

[i6i] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

No funds would have been sent from this side 
except for the principles outlined above. Despite 
all the appeals of Mr. Redmond, the complete 
machinery of the Irish Parliamentary Party, the 
power of the government, the promise of Home 
Rule, a vast recruiting and agitation fund, dire 
poverty and distress increased by the war, unem- 
ployment, lying stories of German brutalities, not 
one company, regiment or battalion has voted to 
recruit or enlist in the army. A few thousand 
individuals have been secured, but the appeal has 
altogether failed, as admitted by the London 
press.* 

As the London Times has admitted, the whole 
of Ireland is under martial law. The censorship 
is rigid. The patriotic newspapers are being sup- 
pressed by the government, including The Irish 
Volunteer, the organ of the National Volunteers. 
The weekly journal, Sinn Fein ("Ourselves 
Alone"), and other papers have been destroyed. 
The Irish World of New York, with a large list 
of readers in Ireland, has been prohibited from 



*The Belfast News of January 14, 1915, which is the leading 
Ulster daily newspaper, jeeringly says that Nationalist Ireland 
has not furnished up to this date more than from 3,000 to 4,000 
recruits, despite the fervent appeals of the Irish members of 
parliament. 

[162] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

entering Ireland. A number of persons have 
been sent to prison for distributing patriotic let- 
ters and pamphlets. Many of the Irish National 
Volunteer companies have changed their meet- 
ing places, and in secret are pledging eternal 
fealty to the cause of Irish freedom. More than 
70,000 men have met within a month, and, by 
resolution, have bound themselves to abide by 
the following declaration of policy hereafter : 

1. To maintain the right and duty of the Irish 
nation henceforward and to provide for its own 
defence by means of a permanent armed and 
trained volunteer force. 

2. To unite the people of Ireland on the bases 
of Irish nationality and a common national in- 
terest ; to maintain the integrity of the nation and 
to resist with all our strength any measures tend- 
ing to bring about or perpetuate disunion or the 
partition of our country. 

3. To resist any attempt to force the men of 
Ireland into military service under any govern- 
ment until a free national government is empow- 
ered by the Irish people themselves to deal with 
It. 

4. To secure the abolition of the system of 
governing Ireland through Dublin Castle and the 

[163] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

British military power, and the establishment of 
a national government in its place. 

The Volunteers never sing the words of the 
English music-hall song, "It's a Long Way to 
Tipperary." The air is a fair marching tune, but 
the words and sentiment are un-Irish. Songs of 
Piccadilly and Leicester Square do not appeal to 
the hearts of Irish mothers. They know, if the 
children recruit, not only will the road to Tip- 
perary be mighty long from Europe, but that 
most of their sons, their sole support, will never 
live to see Tipperary again. 

^TIPPERARY" 

Who is it stands in front of the door? 

Mary O'Fay, Mother O'Fay. 
An' what is she watching an' waiting for? 

Och, none but her soul can say. 

There's a list in the post office long and black, 

With tidings bad and woeful sad; 
The names of the boys who'll ne'er come back, 

An' one is her darling lad. 

We showed her the list : but she cannot read, 
So we told her true, yes, we told her true, 

Her old eyes stared till they'd almost bleed, 
An' she swore that none of us knew. 
[164] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

She's waiting now for Father O'Toole, 
Till he goes her way at the noon of day. 

* * * >|c 

Who is it sprawls upon the sod 

At the break o' day? It's Mickey O'Fay. 

His eyes glare up to the walls of God, 
And half of his head is blown away. 

What is he doing in that strange place, 

Torn and shred, and murdered dead ? 
He's singin' the psalm of the fighting race 

And his soul soars wide o'erhead. 

Who shall we blame for the awful thing — 

For the blood that flows and the heart-wrung throes ? 

Kaiser, or Czar, statesmen or King, 
Och, leave it to Him Who knows ! 

The Irish National Volunteers have before 
them the glorious example of the Volunteers of 
1782, who achieved the legislative independence 
of Ireland. They first organized in the Protes- 
tant Church of Dungannon, County Tyrone, all 
or nearly all Protestants. They demanded liberty 
for Ireland. England was being defeated by 
America in the war of the Revolution, and 
dreaded another insurrection in Ireland. She 
finally yielded, and on the 16th day of April, 1782, 

[165] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

Henry Grattan moved the declaration of rights, 
which made Ireland free and prosperous for a 
brief period of twenty years, when the infamous 
act of union with England was formed.* 

Grattan's amendment for legislative independ- 
ence, as adopted, follows: 

That the kingdom of Ireland is a distinct kingdom, 
with a parliament of her own, the sole legislature 
thereof; that there is no body of men competent to 
make laws to bind the nation, but the king, lords, and 
commons of Ireland, nor any parliament which hath 
any authority or power of any sort whatever in this 
country, save only the parliament of Ireland: to as- 
sure His Majesty, that we humbly conceive that in this 
right the very essence of our liberty exists, a right 
which we, on the part of all the people of Ireland, do 
claim as their birthright, and which we cannot yield 
but with our lives. 

After England was forced to capitulate to the 
United States, two years after the surrender of 
Cornwallis at Yorktown, she proceeded to quar- 
rel with Ireland. Content seemed to reign in that 
country. As year by year her commerce gained 

♦Even under the Union the legal and constitutional title of 
the British kingdoms is "The Kingdoms of Great Britain and 
Ireland." This title should be given on all official documents. 
But as time goes on the kingdom of Ireland is left more and 
more in the background. 

[i66] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

and her industries throve, the spirit of English 
trade jealousies was enkindled and the speedy 
ruin of Irish commerce was resolved on. Eng- 
land played Ireland false as soon as the Volun- 
teers laid down their arms. Grattan trusted the 
word of England on the terms of the final adjust- 
ment. The history of this sordid and wretched 
betrayal of the national agreement is confirmed 
by all historians, including Gladstone and Morley. 
Eighty thousand soldiers were let loose on an 
unarmed and helpless people to destroy them at 
will. Our American correspondents, without ex- 
ception, returning from Belgium, have told us 
that the stories of German atrocities are false. 
But the story of English atrocities in Ireland in 
1796 are confirmed by all historians. 

I quote from one of the most careful authori- 
ties, A. M. Sullivan: 

Irresponsible power was conferred on the military 
officers and local magistracy. The yeomanry, mainly 
composed of Orangemen, were quartered on the most 
Catholic districts, while the Irish militia regiments 
suspected of any sympathy with the population were 
shipped off to England in exchange for foreign troops. 
The military tribunals did not wait for the idle for- 
malities of the civil courts. Soldiers and civilians, 
yeomen and townsmen, against whom the informer 

I167I 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

pointed his finger, were taken out and summarily ex- 
ecuted. Ghastly forms hung upon the thickset gib- 
bets, not only in the market places of the country 
towns and before the public prisons, but on all the 
bridges of the metropolis. The horrid torture of pick- 
eting, and the blood-stained lash, were constantly re- 
sorted to, to "extort accusations or confessions." Lord 
Holland gives us a like picture of "burning cottages, 
tortured backs, and frequent executions." "The fact 
is incontrovertible," he says, "that the people of Ire- 
land were driven to resistance (which, possibly, they 
meditated before) by the free quarters and excesses of 
the soldiery, which were such as are not permitted in 
civilized warfare even in an enemy's country. Dr. 
Dickson, Lord Bishop of Down, assured me that he 
had seen families returning peaceably from Mass as- 
sailed without provocation by drunken troops and yeo- 
manry, and their wives and daughters exposed to 
every species of indignity, brutality, and outrage, from 
which neither his (the bishop's) remonstrances, nor 
those of other Protestant gentlemen, could rescue 
them. 

No wonder the gallant and humane Sir John Moore 
— appalled at the infamies of that lustful and brutal 
soldiery, and unable to repress his sympathy with the 
hapless Irish peasantry — should have exclaimed, "If 
I were an Irishman, I would be a rebel !" 

THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THE CASUALTY LISTS 

In Ireland the poor people are waking up to 
[i68] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

the fact that the British, now, as always, put the 
Irish in the forefront. Although they form a 
small percentage of the army, as well as of the 
British population, the daily mortality rate 
among the Irish troops on the battlefield reaches 
an abnormally high proportion. 

The London Times publishes daily a list of the 
killed and wounded, the preponderating names 
being Irish. We have before us a copy of the 
London Times of Friday, January 8, 1915, which 
gives a list of the killed and wounded reported 
in one day. 

IN THE RANKS 

The following casualties among non-commis- 
sioned officers and men of the expeditionary force 
are reported from the base. Every man is a 
private unless otherwise described: 

UNDER DATE OF NOVEMBER 24. 
KILLED. 
Royal Scots Fusiliers. 
Ashcroft, 10701 J. Givens, 6247 T. 

Beattie, 10816 J. Graham, 9789 P. 

Bruce, 10057 Drmmr T. Hacker, 10879 A. 

Clark, 10809 Cpl. D. Hagan, 10274 H. 

Coll. 9055 D. Harris, 10504 A. 

Collins, 6558 C. Harris, 11040 F. 

Connor, 9419 L. Hendry, 9942 J. 

Doran, 9708 W. , Hooton, 9137 Lce.-Cpl. W. 

Drysdale, 10924 S. Hughes, 10760 T. 

Gillet, 7199 A. Johnston, 9276 J. 

[169] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 



Johnstone, 10799 E. 


Mooney, 9814 J. 


Keatley, 10489 H. 


Morgan, 10683 F. 


King, 9946 T. 


Nelson, 5776 Sergt. J. 


Laird, 9861 J. 


Oglivie, 10282 W. 


Lawrence, 8676 A. 


Page. 10722 D. 


Lindop, 10692 G. 


Parsons, 10170 C. 


Lunn, 97 1 1 A. 


Provis, 9291 W. 


Lunn. 9208 T. 


Roper, 10678 A. V. 


MacGuinness, 10403 J, 


Shearman, 9233 H. 


McAuliffe, 9331 J- 


Smith, 10313 W. 


McBride, 10128 J. 


Stringer, 6420 Sergt. H. 


McCartney, 5753 R- 


Taylor, 8864 Lce.-Sergt. R. 


McLaughlin, 9943 J. 


Watson, 10025 Cpl. W. 


Mallon, 9796 R. 


White, 10229 Cpl. H. 


Mayhew, 941 1 Bndsmn. E. 


Wilson, 8698 J. 


Miles, 8332 Lce.-Cpl. T. 


Wood, 10391 H. 


Mills, 8071 Lce.-Sergt. F. 


Woodfield, 5243 Co. Qrmr. 


Minter, 9751 W. 


Sergt. T. 


Monger, 10648 J. 




King's Own 


Scottish Borderers. 


Boath, 8958 F. 


Keegan, 5853 Corp. W. 


Brown, 7609 J. 


Nelson, 5840 Lce.-Corp. J. 


Cairns, Ii333 J- 


Norton, 11889 C. 


Carty, 10048 J. 


Smith, 7420 D. 


Cook, 8394 H. 


Smy, 9417 Lce.-Corp. F. 


Dawson, 8149 W. 


Turner, 11647 B. 


Elliott, 9127 A. 


Urch, 10456 R. 


Goodman, 11 174 W. 




Seaforth Highlanders. 


Black. 8667 Lce.-Cpl. J. 


Matheson, 676 Drumr. R. 


Campbell, 9470 T. 


O'Brien, 8662 J. 


Devlin, 8128 J. 


Park, 8115 W. 


Docherty, 6871 J. 


Reid, 9349 Lce.-Sergt. D. 


Findlay, 6960 J. 


Robertson, 7594 J- 


Hambly, 6240 C. 


Ross, 6428 D. 


Hislop, 6643 G. 


Salmond, 7882 C. 


Irving, 6481 J. 


Solers, 10597 J- 


Kirkwood, 6785 J. 


Thomas, 6899 J. 


MacAulay, 6893 J. 


Thompson, 9759 J. 


McKinnon, 6369 N. 


Walls, 1461 A. 


Mackie, 7150 A. 





[170] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

Other Regiments. 

Brooke, 6506 Sergt. W., Royal Engineers. 

Byrne, 4108 G., Irish Guards. 

Gould, 28767 Corporal J. D., Royal Engineers. 

DIED OF WOUNDS. 

Campbell, 6460 T., Royal Scots Fus. 

Chambers, 5578 Col.-Sergt. P., Royal Scots Fus. 

Couper, 9128 W., Coldstream Guards. 

Dix, 2537 Trpr. J., 6th Dragoons (attached ist Life Gds.). 

Drumm, 2667 F., Irish Guards. 

Grahame, 62588 Gunr. A. G., Royal Field Artillery. 

Hanley, 6741 H., Scots Guards. 

Harrison, 6745 H. J., Coldstream Gds. 

Henson, 6067 Lce.-Corpl. T. G., 4th Dragoon Gds. 

Innes, 9732 W., Gordon Highrs. 

Kean, 8789 C, Scots Guards. 

Maclntyre, 10501 Lce.-Corpl. R., Royal Scots Fus. 

McCormack, 4094 J., Irish Guards. 

McDonagh, 3310 J., Irish Guards. 

North, 5759 Trpr. T. W., ist Dragoon Gds. (attached ist Life 

Guards). 
Pumphrey, 2265 J. R., Northd Hussars. 
Randell, 7926 H., Scots Guards. 
Riordan, 3728 J., Irish Guards. 



Irish Names 42 

All Others .77 



[171] 



CHAPTER XVI 

THE WOMEN OF IRELAND 

In many parts of Ireland there is only one male 
left to a family. The mothers of Ireland are 
opposed to losing the last boy for England. Dele- 
gations of noble women from Ireland have come 
to America appealing to their countrywomen to 
write letters to Irish families urging them to re- 
fuse their children for the slaughter. They dare 
not take the platform in Ireland any longer or 
use the Irish newspapers, as the country is under 
martial law and any open effort to prevent re- 
cruiting is punishable as an act of treason to 
the Crown. 

These women have been holding meetings in 
New York and various cities, largely attended by 
earnest, intelligent, refined women of Irish ex- 
traction. In pathetic interest, education and en- 
tertainment these weekly gatherings are unique 
and novel even in jaded New York, but the care- 
less or hostile press gives them no attention. 

One of these many meetings of women was 
held the other night in the Blue Room of the Hotel 

[172] 




SARAH CURRAN 

FIANCEE OF ROBERT EMMET 

"She is far from the land where her young hero sleeps, 

And lovers around her are sighing, 
But coldly she turns from their gaze and weeps, 

For lier heart in his grave is lying." 

— Thomas Moore. 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

McAlpin, with three well-known New York 
women in charge — Dr. Gertrude Kelly, Mary 
Atwood Tabor and Dr. Madge McGuinnis. 
Emily Gray gave selections on an Irish harp. 
One of the speakers was the venerable Margaret 
Moore, who went to prison with Parnell in 1879. 
The old lady preserves a wonderful, clear mind, 
and her speech was accorded a great reception. 
She said : 

You have been told that I stand here to-night to 
represent the past. It is not a dead past, however. 
It is full of inspiration, hope and encouragement, 
which we now hope to see grow stronger and greater 
in the dawn of a new day of freedom for Ireland. 

Women always came to the rescue in Ireland when 
Ireland needed them. When the Milesians came to 
Ireland, Queen Scotia and her three daughters fought 
in the field. She fell in battle; and from that time 
on there never has been a day when women were not 
ready and willing to strike for Ireland's cause. The 
women of Limerick took their place beside the men. 
Then came another day of spirit for Ireland. 

The Land League came. At first the Land League 
was scoffed at. Then the government became uneasy 
about its power. Then they passed the Coercion Act. 
Then some of the leaders were taken up. It was in 
these days that Michael Davitt could not bear to see 
her work go down in destruction. He could not bear 

[173] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND. IRISH FREEDOM 

to see the flag of freedom go down in the dust and 
be trampled on by its enemies. He knew how brave 
his mother was in the days of eviction. He remem- 
bered the bravery of the women of the Fenian days. 
And he called on the women of Ireland to come for- 
ward in Ireland's danger. 

Since I was a baby I was interested in everything 
for the welfare of my native land. 

In those days stones were thrown at us, not by us. 
We did not mind that; they did us no harm. The 
Land League grew apace. One can hardly understand 
how the dead hearts of the people seemed to revive as 
they knew that the women were standing behind the 
men, and the men could not turn back on the onward 
march because of the women who stood behind them. 
I had believed that Ireland's chains, rusted by the 
blood and tears of centuries, were in such a condition 
that even a woman's weak hands could break them 
asunder. 

Then Mr. Parnell came. I would like to make a 
personal remark here. While some newspapers spoke 
of me as going to jail for rioting, I never was in a 
riot. I never threw a stone in my life. I went to jail 
for attempting to "excite disaffection in the hearts of 
Her Majesty's subjects." 

The women did their work gloriously. We worked 
so well and so strong that we were able to bring about 
the downfall of the Chief Secretary for Ireland — 
Buckshot Forster. 

We have seen strange changes in Ireland since those 
days. We women did not give up the fight. The 

[174] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

men came forward when they got out of jail and they 
took the banner from us, and they did not even thank 
us for holding it for them. 

To-day we are facing a greater crisis than ever. 
Ireland must keep her men at home, and every Irish- 
man and Irishwoman in this country and in Ireland 
should be aware of the many reasons why Ireland 
should never fight for England. There has been more 
blood shed by England and for England than would 
buy freedom for the whole of Europe. That day must 
end. If Irish blood is shed it must be shed for Ire- 
land only. Men calling themselves Irishmen will dare 
to come forward and ask the youth of Ireland to join 
and become corrupted by the most immoral army in 
Europe. 

Referring to Lord Roberts, Mrs. Moore said: 

I am glad they did not put him in Westminster Ab- 
bey. That place is desecrated enough as it is. This 
Christian for whom they played "Onward, Christian 
Soldiers" — he in a letter to the departments of India 
demanded with authority that they should see to it 
that a certain number of attractive healthy women 
should be provided for the entertainment of the sol- 
diers. 

Are Irishwomen to let their sons go into any army 
where their morals will be destroyed? We are very 
proud of Irishmen who refuse to go forth to fight in 
this war. Even if they are unemployed they will know 
it is better to starve at home. 

[175] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

We know that before this war began Roberts 
went to King George and whispered in his ear, 
"Don't sign that Home Rule Bill or the army will 
revolt." Then came French and others, and they 
said, "We will not lead troops against the North." 
And a few days afterward they wanted the very 
men they threatened to fight for "their King and 
country." I deny that the Irish have a king. 
They have a country only, and let them look to 
that. Let them keep their country free and keep 
her in the proper place. Let them not forget 
their history. Let them not forget their ruins. 

Let us hold up the hands of our sisters in Ire- 
land. Let us hold up the hands of the men in 
Ireland. And with God's help we will try to help 
them. We want freedom for the land that bore 
us. 

Mrs. Padraig Colum of Dublin read a speech 
dealing in a comprehensive way with the state of 
things in Ireland, and the Irish volunteer move- 
ment. 



[176] 




THEOBALD WOLFE TONE 

"The connection between Great Britain and Ireland is the 
curse of the Irish nation, while it lasts my country cannot 
be free nor happy. Success in the eyes of the vulgar, fixes its 
merits. Washington succeeded, while Kosciusko failed. I 
await the Death which awaits me." 



CHAPTER XVII 

LEADERS OF IRELAND 

The little island across the sea has produced more 
than her share of heroes, patriots, poets, dram- 
atists, statesmen and soldiers, and by the same 
token she has managed to furnish an unusual 
number of weak leaders, traitors and inform- 
ers. For every Irishman sent to the scaffold or 
the dungeon, there has been another to swear his 
life away. It was the bribery and the weakness 
of some of the Irish princes which enabled the 
Anglo-Normans to extend their sway over large 
portions of Ireland in the twelfth century. In 
the next six hundred years of her history we find 
the work of martyrs and patriots checked or de- 
stroyed by treason in her own ranks. The life 
of Robert Emmet might have been saved but for 
the wretched informer who spied on his last meet- 
ing with the beautiful Sarah Curran. The United 
Irishmen Society was struck a fatal blow in 1798 
by the treachery of one of its members, Thomas 
Reynolds, which caused the death of Lord Ed- 
ward Fitzgerald. This rebellion was watched by 

[177] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

George Washington from America with the deep- 
est interest and sympathy, as some of his friends 
in the American revolution were participants, and 
he was grieved at Mount Vernon, the last year 
of his life, when he heard of the failure of the 
revolution of 1798. Lord Cornwallis, whom 
Washington had taken prisoner at Yorktown, 
was the English commander who crushed the 
men of '98. The hero was Wolfe Tone, who, 
captured after heroic defence, begged that 
he be shot like a soldier, not hanged as a felon. 
His petition was rejected and he was said to have 
committed suicide, although some writers insist 
that he was murdered by his jailers, who feared 
openly to kill, except as a soldier, a man who was 
captured in the uniform of a French colonel. 

The Act of Union 1802 between Great Britain 
and Ireland was forced through by shameless 
bribery and promises of office. Lord Castlereagh 
purchased twenty-five Irish members of Parlia- 
ment, the necessary number to pass the measure. 
The two men who betrayed their unfortunate 
country to England were Lord Castlereagh and 
Lord Clare. The first died by his own hand, the 
second, bitterly regretting his infamy, died of a 
broken heart. 

[178] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

Lord Byron, the great poet, when he heard the 
fate of Castlereagh, wrote : 

"So Castlereagh has cut his throat ! The worst 
Of this is — that he cut his country's the first! 
So he has cut his throat at last! He! Who? 
The man who cut his country's long ago." 

Fourteen new government places were created 
for Irish members. Thirty-two new peers were 
created, every one being an Irish member of the 
House of Commons who had voted for the Act 
of Union. Something like $2,500,000 was spent 
in bribery by the Crown agents. The salaried 
places given to deserting opposition members 
amounted to $340,000 per annum. Sixty-one 
titles were granted. Of the 162 men who voted 
for the union, 116 held government places by 
1803, and 34 bought fine estates. 

After the Young Irelanders were driven to 
death or prisons in 1848, the leaders were John 
Sadlier of Tipperary and William Keogh of 
Athlone. The first was a banker, the second a 
lawyer. The two led the Catholic defense move- 
ment and were alluded to sarcastically by the 
English papers as the "Pope's Brass Band." The 
pair were strict Constitutionalists, viewed with 
suspicion by the crushed remnants of the revolu- 

[ 179] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

tion, but as reactions always follow revolutions, 
the patriots could only look on. The issue of the 
hour was the Tenant Rights Bill and opposition 
to the British Government. Sadlier, Keogh and 
O'Flaherty held the balance of power. The fate 
of a new ministry was in their hands when ter- 
rible news arrived from London in 1852 that the 
Irish brigade in Parliament had sold their coun- 
try for the jobs. John Sadlier was Lord of the 
Treasury, William Keogh was made Irish Solici- 
tor-General, and Edmond O'Flaherty was ap- 
pointed Commissioner of Income Tax. The 
argosy containing patriotic hopes was wrecked. 
As time went on the Irish drew away from Sadlier 
in horror. Confidence in his banks was de- 
stroyed, and in the dead of the night he walked 
out of his English town house. Early in the 
morning passers-by noticed a body lying on 
Hampstead Heath. John Sadlier had taken 
poison and died by his own hand. The news cre- 
ated a frightful panic in Ireland. Mobs of coun- 
try people stormed the Sadlier banks, only to 
learn they had lost their all. Even the poor 
guardian funds were gone. 

England in Ireland, as everywhere else that 
her misrule has gone, has depended upon gold to 

[i8o] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

sustain her power. Wherever she can find a 
Benedict Arnold, a Castlereagh, a James Carey, 
she has poured out her gold like water in order 
to get men to betray the cause of their country 
and to introduce dissension and distrust into the 
ranks of those who oppose her. Her motto always 
has been — like that of Rome — Divide et impera, 
and signs multiply both in Ireland and America 
that she is at her old game among the needy, the 
unscrupulous and the envious ones of the race, to 
make them misrepresent real conditions and 
induce their too trustful countrymen to forgive 
the past and come to her assistance in this hour 
of dreadful danger. But she has played the game 
once too often, and even the timid and weak men 
who were tacitly or openly on her side because 
of her supposed invincibility are now awakening 
to a full realization of her real weakness, and con- 
tempt and dislike are now rapidly replacing the 
dread which they had for her at the outbreak 
of this war. The extraordinary achievements of 
the German Navy — the Hogue, Cressy, Aboukir 
incidents, the sinking of the Audacious on the 
Irish coast and of the Formidable in the English 
Channel — have destroyed the prestige of the Eng- 
lish Navy and made Irishmen realize that the in- 

[i8i] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

vasion both of England and Ireland are reason- 
able probabilities, and in view of such a contin- 
gency the appeals of Redmond and his allies to 
young Irishmen to go with the English army or 
navy are falling on deaf ears.* 

*Mr. Bourassa Refused a Hearing — Meeting at Ottawa 
Broken Up (Toronto, December 17). — A meeting at Ottawa, 
which was to have been addressed bj^ Mr. Henri Bourassa, the 
leader of the Nationalist movement in Quebec, was broken up 
under dramatic conditions. There was constant interruption 
from two or three hundred members of the Sons of England 
Lodges and other elements of the audience. They demanded 
that he should wave the Union Jack, but Mr. Bourassa, who 
preserved his good temper throughout, said : "I am a British 
subject, but I will not wave the British flag under compulsion." 

As he remained obdurate the crowd invaded the platform and 
the curtain was rung down. For several hours hundreds re- 
mained in the theatre singing patriotic songs and cheering. 

Later Mr. Bourassa read his speech to a small company at the 
Chateau Laurier. His chief argument was that the first duty of 
Canada was to itself, and the principle of autonomy and the 
rights of minorities were not contrary to the idea of the British 
connection. — From our own correspondent. 



[182] 




DANIEL O'CONNELL 
"the great liberator" 



CHAPTER XVIII 

YOUNG IRELAND OF 1848 

The men of '48 ! The brief and ill-starred revo- 
lution in Ireland in the year 1848 developed a 
galaxy of young men and women of genius, 
equalled, perhaps, though not surpassed, by the 
heroic and brilliant Girondists. The daring 
deeds of revolution is always the work of youth. 
That the Ireland of to-day seems to lack the 
spirit of active patriotism may be ascribed to the 
preponderance of the aged among her declining 
population. The proportion of old people, apply- 
ing for age pensions, startled the pension officials, 
and an investigation showed that Ireland had 
more old people and fewer young men, in pro- 
portion, than any country in the world. Her 
present political leaders are nearly all old men. 
Daniel O'Connell is believed to have been the 
most powerful and effective orator of the last 
century. The late Mr. Gladstone and other au- 
thorities agree that no man of modern times af- 
fected so many persons through the art of pub- 
lic speaking. The writer has stood on the an- 

[183] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

cient Hill of Tara, where O'Connell once spoke 
to 200,000 people, the largest audience on record, 
and Lord Byron said his words could be heard 
distinctly on the farthermost edge of the crowd. 
Wendell Phillips, America's famous platform 
orator, visited the House of Commons to study 
the method of O'Connell's oratory. Afterward 
Mr. Phillips said, *'this is the man, there are the 
lips, the most wonderful to speak the English 
tongue." To this day you see Irish pilgrims from 
all parts of the world visiting the mausoleum in 
Glasnevin to place their hands on his coffin. He 
won religious liberty for his country. And he 
rested. History is merely a record of change, 
and no leader of the people can afford to stand 
still. Young Ireland demanded political, as well 
as religious, freedom. The veteran was amazed 
that any one in Ireland should question his leader- 
ship. His pride and prestige seemed hurt. He 
denounced the young men and women of the 
new party as firebrands and ungrateful fanatics. 
He constantly kept telling them that his conserva- 
tive policies would bear fruit; they must wait. 
But he failed to see that the new generation was 
slipping away from him, determined to challenge 
his supremacy. The brave old lion was tired and 

[184] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

needed a rest, and he should have given up the 
leadership. The fate of revolutionists who rest 
is certain. Danton, tired and weary, went to the 
country, while Robespierre took advantage of 
his absence from the conflict and sent him to the 
scaffold. Revolutions wait not on the old or the 
weary. 

And then crashing down on unfortunate Ire- 
land like a wild whirlwind of horror and destruc- 
tion in the seasons of 1846-47, came the frightful 
famine. The neglect of Ireland, the woes of cen- 
turies, the maladministration of her conquerors, 
the failure of the government to cope with the 
wretched conditions, bureaucratic delays, brought 
on in the fog and blackness of the night the 
most terrible fate that can befall a people — star- 
vation. O'Connell broke under the frightful 
strain. He had lived too long, because he had 
lived to see the destruction of his country. He 
went to Italy and died at Genoa on the 15th of 
May, 1847. 

One day in 1842 three young men were walk- 
ing in Phoenix Park, Dublin. They were 
Charles Gavan Duffy, Thomas Davis and John 
Blake Dillon. They decided on an independent 
policy, and they founded a newspaper, The Na- 

[185] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

Hon. This journal finally became the guide and 
counsellor of the young men of Ireland. From 
this band of young men and women, working on 
that paper, burst forth a new Irish poetry and 
literature, which has been translated into many 
languages and is still preserved in every library 
and will live for centuries. They were the first 
to break down the antagonisms between Protes- 
tants and Catholics. Thomas Davis was a Prot- 
estant in religion, and he wrote: 

What matter that at different shrines 

We pray unto one God? 
What matter that at different times 

Our fathers won this sod? 

In fortune and in name we're bound 

By stronger links than steel; 
And neither can be safe or sound 

But in the other's weal. 

And oh, it were a gallant deed 

To show before mankind 
How every race and every creed 

Might be by love combined — 

They struggled to improve the tone of Irish 
life. They denounced the taking of office by 
patriots, on the ground that once a man gets on 
a British Government payroll he loses interest in 
the cause of Ireland. 

[i86] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

Glorious are the names of the young Ireland- 
ers. They were sentenced to convict colonies, 
and yet they lived to become leaders of public 
opinion throughout the world. Duffy rose to be 
prime minister of Australia; McGee became a 
cabinet minister of railways in Canada; Meagher, 
the great orator, commanded the American Irish 
Brigade of the Civil War, and died as governor 
of Montana. Richard O'Gorman died the fore- 
most member of the New York Bar. Kevin 
O'Doherty was leader of the Queensland legisla- 
ture. Richard Dalton Williams, the poet, died a 
distinguished physician at New Orleans. The 
small band of revolutionists produced three 
great literary women — Eva Mary Kelly, Lady 
Wilde and Ellen Downing. The literary works of 
John K. Ingram, James Clarence Mangin, Sam- 
uel Ferguson, Denis Florence MacCarthy make 
priceless the literature of the Young Ireland 
movement. William Smith O'Brien, a Protes- 
tant, was the active leader. In 1843 he announced, 
after serving fourteen years in the British Parlia- 
ment, that England was the enemy of his country 
and there was no hope for Ireland in the union as 
it existed between Ireland and Great Britain. 

The first man, since Robert Emmet, to advo- 
[187] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

cate physical resistance in Ireland, was one of 
the '48 men, John Mitchel, the grandfather of 
Mayor Mitchel of New York. He was the son 
of an Unitarian minister in an Ulster county. 
The government passed through Parliament a 
law designed to make the speeches of Mitchel and 
others treasonable. John Mitchel was arrested 
on the 22d day of May, 1848, and found guilty 
in two days. He was sentenced to fourteen years' 
transportation to the convict colonies across the 
seas while twelve thousand government troops 
surrounded the court house to prevent a contem- 
plated rescue. When asked by the Court if he 
had anything to say, he replied: "My lords, I 
knew I was setting my life on that cast. The 
course which I have opened is only commenced. 
The Roman who saw his hand burning to ashes 
before the tyrant promised that three hundred 
should follow out his enterprise. Can I not prom- 
ise for one — for two — for three — ay, for hun- 
dreds ?" His friends in the courtroom cried out, 
"Promise for me, Mitchel! Promise for me!" 
Arms were drawn, the troops drove back the 
crowd. The prisoner was carried to the cells 
below. Early in the morning, heavily manacled, 
chains from his wrists to his ankles, he was car- 

[i88] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

ried out to sea. The police destroyed the Nation 
office and arrested Duffy, then followed the ar- 
rest and conviction of the remaining leaders. 
O'Brien, Meagher, MacManus and O'Donohue 
were sentenced to be Hanged, beheaded, disem- 
bowelled and quartered. The ferocity of the 
sentences affected callous England, and they were 
commuted to life-long imprisonment in the con- 
vict quarters of Australia, where the prisoners 
were transported July 29, 1849. 

The speeches from the dock of these young 
Nationalists, sentenced to die, occupy an impor- 
tant place in the world's tragic literature. The 
circumstances under which they spoke never 
caused them to falter. They were about to die, 
but they were to die for Ireland. Not one failed 
or faltered, and their young voices ringing out 
in the courtroom have been heard all over the 
world. It is that spirit which tears the heart- 
strings of the sons of Irish emigrants the world 
over at the call of Redmond for Irish lives to 
save England. All the government jobs of 
the British Empire would not have moved the 
Young Irelanders of 1848 to recruit for Eng- 
land. 

"The liberty of the world," said Daniel O'Con- 
[189] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

nell, facing the Young Ireland leaders, **is not 
worth the shedding of one drop of blood." Alas 
for the memory of O'Connell! If that doctrine 
were true, we citizens of America would have 
no imperishable memories other than as a colony 
of Great Britain. There would be no Washing- 
ton's Birthday holiday, no Thomas Jefferson, 
Andrew Jackson, no immortal friend of freedom, 
of the poor and lowly, Abraham Lincoln. The 
glory of America, as of Ireland, rests with her 
patriots, heroes and republicans who dared face 
and contest, in the name of liberty, hostile majori- 
ties at home and abroad. The line between suc- 
cessful revolution and failure is extremely nar- 
row. Not one out of a hundred succeeds. Suc- 
cess is followed by power, temporary gratitude, 
glory, honors, monuments ; failure is followed by 
suffering, misery, ofttimes obloquy and death. 
The martyrdom of failure and revolution are 
twin brothers. 

The sacrifices of the Young Irelanders made 
possible Parnell's movement, the various Land 
Acts and the right of the natives of Ireland 
to own the soil of their country. The writer 
believes that the writings of John Mitchel are 
the greatest force for the perpetuation of the 

[190] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

spirit of Irish freedom. From his cell in New- 
gate Prison he wrote to a friend: "For me, I 
abide my fate joyfully; for I know that, whatever 
betide me, my work is nearly done. Yes; moral 
force and 'patience and perseverance' are scat- 
tered to the wild winds of heaven. The music 
my countrymen now love best to hear is the rat- 
tle of arms and the ring of the rifle. As I sit 
here and write in my lonely cell, I hear, just 
dying away, the measured tramp of ten thousand 
marching men — my gallant confederates, un- 
armed and silent, but with hearts like bended 
bow, waiting till the time comes. They have 
marched past my prison windows to let me know 
there are ten thousand fighting men in Dublin — 
'felons' in heart and soul. I thank God for it. 
The game is afoot at last. The liberty of Ire- 
land may come sooner or later, by peaceful ne- 
gotiation or bloody conflict, but it is sure; and 
wherever between the poles I may chance to be, 
I will hear the crash of the downfall of the 
thrice-accursed British Empire." 

Mitchel remained, undaunted in spirit, for 
seven years in the convict colony of Van Diemens 
Land. Conspirators in the United States effected 
his escape. He arrived safely in San Francisco, 

[191] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

California, October 12, 1853. He founded the 
Daily Citizen of New York, and moved to the 
South, where he was editor of the Richmond Ex- 
aminer, and, strange to say, espoused the cause 
of the Southern Confederacy, two of his sons 
dying on the battlefields of the South. Mitchel 
was a private in the Southern army, was taken 
prisoner by the Federals, released through Irish 
friends, returned to New York in 1867, founded 
the Irish Citizen, was elected member of Parlia- 
ment from Tipperary County, while in New 
York, returned to Ireland, and died shortly 
after. 

John Martin was the friend of John Mitchel. 
He took up the cause of Mitchel and founded the 
United Irishman. The government destroyed 
his paper, and he established another, the Irish 
Felon. He was incarcerated in the dungeons of 
Newgate. From the depths of his underground 
cell, filled with slime and water, he wrote these 
words to the patriots of 1848: 

"Let them menace you with the hulks or the 
gibbet for daring to speak or write of your love 
of Ireland. Let them threaten to mow you down 
with grape-shot, as they massacred your kins- 
men with famine and plague. Spurn their brutal 

[ 192] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

acts of Parliament, trample upon their lying 
proclamations — fear them not !" 

John Martin was found guilty of treason, and 
sentenced to Van Diemens Land, the convict 
colony. He said in court: 

"My object is to assist in establishing the na- 
tional independence of Ireland for the benefit of 
all the people of Ireland. National independ- 
ence will prevent much of the pauperism, starva- 
tion and misery which prevails in Ireland." 

On one of those stormy days of 1848, William 
Smith O'Brien said: ''Irish freedom must be 
won by Irish courage. Ireland's problems can 
only be solved by a republic." O'Brien headed 
the revolution. A large reward was offered for 
his apprehension. His military following was 
finally reduced to hundreds. His little army de- 
stroyed, O'Brien fought with a handful in the 
mountains. At last he was captured and taken 
to Thurles. His trial lasted two short days, and 
he was sentenced to be hanged, beheaded and 
quartered. He was reprieved, sent to Maria's 
Island for life, where he was treated with great 
severity. 

Through the aid of friends in Tasmania he 
nearly escaped. His health failing, he was trans- 

[193] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

ported to Port Arthur. His friends secured a 
pardon in 1854, and he returned to Ireland after 
an exile of eight years. He died in 1864, broken 
in health and spirits. 

Of the Young Ireland leaders the name dear- 
est to Americans is Thomas Francis Meagher. 
He won fame as a writer and orator at the early- 
age of twenty-three. He was opposed to what 
has been termed O'Connell's doctrine of passive 
resistance. In speaking against this theory, he 
said: "I am not one of those tame moralists 
who say that liberty is not worth one drop of 
blood. Against this maxim the noblest virtue that 
has saved and sanctified humanity appears in 
judgment. From the blue waters of the Bay of 
Salamis; from the valley over which the sun 
stood still and lit the Israelites to victory; from 
the cathedral in which the sword of Poland has 
been sheathed in the shroud of Kosciusko; from 
the convent of St. Isadore, where the fiery hand 
that rent the ensign of St. George upon the Plains 
of Ulster has mouldered into dust ; from the sands 
of the desert, where the wild genius of the Al- 
gerine so long has scared the eagle of the Pyre- 
nees; from the ducal palace of this kingdom, 
where the memory of the gallant and seditious 

[ 194] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

Geraldine enhances, more than royal favor, the 
splendor of his race; from the solitary grave 
within this mute city which a dying bequest has 
left without an epitaph, oh! from every spot 
where heroism has had a sacrifice or liberty a 
triumph, a voice breaks in on the cringing 
crowd, that cherishes this wretched maxim, cry- 
ing out, 'Away with it ! away with it !' " 

Meagher was arrested in 1848. Out of a jury 
of 300 drawn in Clonmel only 18 Catholic names 
appeared in the panel. He was found guilty and 
transported to the Australian convict colony. His 
speech from the dock is famous in history. 
Among other things, he said, "Ji-^<^g^d by the law 
of England, I know this crime entails on me the 
penalty of death; but the history of Ireland ex- 
plains that crime and justifies it." 

Meagher escaped to America in 1852. He 
founded the Irish News in New York, and be- 
came one of America's celebrated orators. When 
the Civil War broke out in 1861 he raised a 
zouave company, joined the 69th New York 
Regiment, a famous fighting regiment under 
Colonel Michael Corcoran, and then organized 
one of the most celebrated divisions in the Army 
of the Potomac, Meagher^s Irish Brigade, com- 

[ 195 ] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

posed of New York, Massachusetts, Pennsyl- 
vania, Ohio and IlHnois regiments of men born 
in Ireland. His brigade was cut to pieces in the 
sanguinary battle of Gettysburg. Meagher es- 
caped with his own life, and, after the war, was 
appointed governor of Montana, where he was 
drowned by accident in 1867. 

When Mitchel fell and the Nation and the 
United Irishman newspapers were destroyed, 
Keven Izod O'Doherty established the Irish 
Tribune. The government seized the paper and 
placed O'Doherty in the Newgate dungeon. He 
was found guilty on the third trial and trans- 
ported to the convict station in Australia. He 
managed to get away and reached France. He 
had been engaged to the beautiful and gifted Eva 
Kelly of the Nation staff, whom he married in 
1856, and he became a famous surgeon in 
Australia. 

On the 10th day of November, 1861, the most 
wonderful funeral but one, the exception being 
the funeral of Charles Stuart Parnell, was seen 
in Dublin. The bones of Terence Bellew Mac- 
Manus, who escaped from the convict camp of 
Australia, were brought from California. Six 
thousand miles away they brought the remains of 

[196] 




JOHN MITCHEL 

"The game is afoot at last. The liberty of Ireland will 
come later with the downfall of the British Empire." 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

one of the expatriated of '48. From all four 
corners of the world the exiles gathered in Dub- 
lin, the world's greatest funeral — from the 
United States, Canada, Australia, South Amer- 
ica, India, West Indies, the Continent the exiles 
delegated men and women to follow the coffin 
to Glasnevin. For much of the history of Ire- 
land is written, not in books, but on the tombs 
of the dead. 



[197] 



CHAPTER XIX 

THE UPRISING OF 1865 

The ill-starred revolutionary movement of 1865, 
known as the Fenian movement, failed sadly, yet 
history records that the uprising led to the birth 
of the Home Rule Party, the defeat of the land- 
lords in their long political control of Ireland, 
and to the scaring of England into granting some 
local reforms. The records of history will be 
searched in vain to prove where England ever 
made any concessions to Ireland except through 
fear of revolution or because the Irish held the 
balance of power in the House of Commons. 

The Fenian movement was organized in New 
York, and America furnished the supplies. It 
was a purely revolutionary society directed at the 
British government of Ireland. The foremost 
leaders were James Stephens, Charles J- Kick- 
ham, John O'Leary and Thomas Clarke Luby, 
all but O'Leary being Protestants. It is a curious 
fact in the history of Ireland that a majority 
of her foremost rebels have been Protestants, as 
well as being poets and writers. The leaders of 

[198] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

the Fenians in New York were John O'Mahony, 
Michael Doherty and Colonel Michael Corcoran 
of the famous fighting 69th Regiment of New 
York. They had the support of three New York 
newspapers. 

In April, 1865, the Civil War in the United 
States was closed by the surrender of the South 
at Appomattox and the Irish regiments enrolled 
in the Fenian organization by the thousands. 
Large sums of money were secured for the arm- 
ing of the Fenian brotherhoods in Ireland. The 
British Government struck quickly before the 
guns from America could be delivered. The 
leaders were arrested and charged with high 
treason. Stephens effected a prison conspiracy 
and escaped, Luby, O'Leary and Kickham were 
sent to prison for twenty years at hard labor, 
others were sent to prison for life, many were 
flogged on the backs with whips steeped in vine- 
gar. The uprisings in seven counties were put 
down. 

The inevitable Irish traitor appeared in the per- 
son of Corydon, the informer. Off Sandy Hook, 
New York, a ship lay. On board were five thou- 
sand stand of arms, three pieces of field artillery 
and ammunition. In charge were officers of the 

[ 199] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

Irish Brigade fresh from the Union army. Most 
of the American people were secretly or openly 
in sympathy with the revolutionists, because of 
the opposition of England to the American 
Union in the Civil War and on account of the 
admiration in the United States for the valor and 
patriotic devotion of the Irish soldiers in the 
War of the Rebellion. Friendly American sym- 
pathizers had contributed large sums of money 
to the Fenian cause. The ship reached Sligo 
Bay, but the revolution was at an end in Ireland. 
The trouble had spread to the English cities, 
where the Irish were numerous. In 1867 two 
conspirators, Kelly and Deasy, were arrested in 
Manchester, England. The Fenians resolved on 
rescue. The two were handcuifed and locked in 
the prison van guarded by twelve policemen. A 
party of thirty men attacked the van. They de- 
manded of Sergeant Brett, who was inside, to 
deliver up the keys. He refused and a revolver 
shot was fired at the keyhold to break the lock. 
By mistake Sergeant Brett was hit by the bullet 
and died. The prisoners were rescued and es- 
caped. A few days later William Philip Allen, 
Michael Larkin, Thomas Maguire, Michael 
O'Brien and Edward Condon were tried for the 

[ 200] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

murder of the policeman. They were found 
guilty of wilful murder, although the killing was 
an accident. 
Condon said: 

I only trust that those who are to be tried after us 
will have a fair trial, and that our blood will satisfy 
the craving which I understand exists. You will soon 
send us before God, and I am perfectly prepared to 
go. I have nothing to regret, or retract or take back. 
I can only say GOD SAVE IRELAND. 

At daybreak on the morning of the 23d day 
of November, 1867, Allen, Larkin and O'Brien 
were led forth to die. Long lines of troops sur- 
rounded the jail. A savage crowd of Manchester 
people watched the execution. All three died 
bravely. Their bodies were refused their rela- 
tives, buried in quicklime and in unconsecrated 
ground. In Dublin 60,000 men marched behind 
three empty hearses as an evidence of protest. 

"god save Ireland" 

High upon the gallows tree 

Swung the noble-hearted three. 

By the vengeful tyrant stricken in their bloom; 

But they met him face to face, 

With the courage of their race. 

And they went with souls undaunted to their doom. 

[20l] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

"God save Ireland!" said the heroes; 

"God save Ireland !" said they all. 

"Whether on the scaffold high, 

Or the battlefield we die, 

O, what matter, when for Erin dear we fall !" 

Girt around with cruel foes, 

Still their spirits proudly rose, 

For they thought of hearts that loved them, far and 

near; 
Of the millions true and brave 
O'er the ocean's swelling wave, 
And the friends in holy Ireland ever dear. 
"God save Ireland!" said they proudly; 
"God save Ireland !" said they all. 
"Whether on the scaffold high, 
Or the battlefield we die, 
O, what matter, when for Erin dear we fall !" 

Climbed they up the rugged stair, 

Rung their voices out in prayer. 

Then with England's fatal cord around them cast, 

Close beneath the gallows tree, 

Kissed like brothers lovingly, 

True to home, and faith, and freedom, to the last. 

"God save Ireland !" prayed they loudly; 

"God save Ireland !" said they all. 

"Whether on the scaffold high, 

Or the battlefield we die, 

O, what matter, when for Erin dear we fall !" 

[ 202 ] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

Never till the latest day- 
Shall the memory pass away 
Of the gallant lives thus given for our land; 
But on the cause must go, 
Amidst joy, or weal, or woe, 
Till we've made our isle a nation free and grand, 
"God save Ireland !" say we proudly ; 
"God save Ireland !" say we all. 
"Whether on the scaffold high, 
Or the battlefield we die, 
O, what matter, when for Erin dear we fall !" 

Allen, Larkin and O'Brien were humble men, 
but their terrible fate and the belief in their in- 
nocence caused Parnell to take up the struggle 
for Ireland. Our true men and women never 
forget the cause of Irish liberty which ever re- 
verberates in their ears from the clanging of the 
chains in the prison dungeon to the dying cry of 
"God save Ireland" on the scaffold at Man- 
chester. 

The world can thank or curse, as the case may 
be, the Fenian Revolutionary Brotherhood for 
the submarine which is doing such deadly execu- 
tion, especially on the part of Germany in the 
North Seas. The great inventor, John P. Hol- 
land, improved and developed the submarine, and 
his improvements first made it practical. Holland 

[ 203 1 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

was a young inventive Irish genius, an ardent 
Irish revolutionist of the Fenian brotherhood or 
circle led by the celebrated Catalpa Jim Reynolds, 
who organized a band of patriots, who success- 
fully effected the rescue of the Fenian political 
prisoners from the Australian convict colonies 
about forty years ago. As a conspirator, Holland 
thought out the idea of a submarine boat to be 
used under water to destroy the English fleet. 
There was much feeling throughout the United 
States against England after the Civil War, and 
many citizens believed that war between the two 
countries was imminent. The plan of Holland 
was to use the submarines against England near 
American and Irish harbors. The Fenian 
Brotherhood supplied Holland with some $50,000, 
and he constructed the first known successful sub- 
marine, christened it the Fenian Ram, and dedi- 
cated the underwater craft to the Irish Republic. 
This led Holland to develop submarines, and the 
world acknowledges that to the brain of Holland 
chiefly is due the creation of the modern sub- 
marine. 



[204] 



CHAPTER XX 

THE SITUATION IN IRELAND 

The first contested election for a member of 
Parliament in Ireland, since the Home Rule Bill 
was signed by the king, was held in Kings 
County recently. This county is strongly Na- 
tionalist and has been held by the Irish Party, 
under the leadership of Parnell and Redmond, 
almost unanimously, for thirty years. The Red- 
mondite convention, the political machine in Ire- 
land, nominated P. F. Adams for the seat of 
North Kings. The Nationalists, who are opposed 
to Redmond, decided to run an independent can- 
didate against Mr. Adams. The regular party 
was shocked that any such impudent challenge to 
Redmond's leadership should be made at this 
juncture and all the powerful machinery of the 
party, supported by the government, was brought 
to North Kings to crush the insurgents. Outside 
of the district little attention was paid to the 
contest, as the Parliamentary Party scoffed, at 
first, at the candidacy of the Anti-Redmond 
Nationalist. The whips of the party said that 

[205] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

Mr. E. J. Graham, the independent, would secure 
no more than a handful of votes. A dozen of 
Redmond's members of Parliament stumped the 
district appealing for support of the party can- 
didate. Loyalty to the country, loyalty to Red- 
mond, demanded the triumphant election of Mr. 
Adams. "All England is watching the result in 
Tullamore," said John Muldoon, member of 
Parliament. 

Speaking at Tuam on the Sunday before the 
election, John Redmond said that Graham had 
flouted his leadership and repudiated the Parlia- 
mentary Party and the convention. Mr. Red- 
mond closed his speech with this final appeal: 

I call upon the electors of Kings County to crush, 
through the ballot box, this act of insubordination. 

The result of the first contest since the Home 
Rule Bill was passed came as a surprise and 
shock to Mr, Redmond and to the government. 
The vote follows: 

Graham (Anti-Redmond) .... 1,667 
Adams (Redmond) 1.588 

As soon as the government received word of 
the result at North Kings, the military and police 
authorities stopped the publication of Ireland, a 

[206] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

Dublin daily paper which was hostile to the Irish 
Party. 

Ireland is under martial law and all the forces 
of the government are employed to crush, as an 
act of treason, any criticism of the authorities 
which now include Mr. Redmond. Free speech 
and a free press are denied. The following in- 
timation was received by the writer, who is a 
subscriber to a paper called Eire or Ireland, in 
Dublin, lately suppressed. It is simply copied 
from a Dublin paper and press censored: 

"A circular issued on Saturday "to the readers 
of Eire . . . Ireland/' and signed by Messrs. 
Arthur Griffith and Sean T. O'Ceallaigh, refers 
to the suppression of the Irish Worker and other 
papers. It states that, although the printer of 
the Worker endeavored to comply with the de- 
mands of the British military authorities, he "had 
his private property seized and his means of live- 
lihood taken away." The circular concludes: 
"In the circumstances, the printer of Ireland has 
felt himself unable to continue printing that jour- 
nal. The editor of Eire wishes to add that the 
printer of Ireland has acted throughout with 
courage, and if he could not further continue to 

[207] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

print the journal, in view of the fate of a man 
whose printing office has been invaded by armed 
force and whose property and means of Hveli- 
hood have been summarily confiscated, despite 
the fact that he had, to the best of his judgment, 
complied with British military orders, no reflec- 
tion rests upon Mr. Mahon" (the printer of Ire- 
land), 

In a word, Ireland is treated by England and 
her allies as a conquered country; all real news 
is suppressed; newspapers are seized, and any 
man daring to express an opinion in opposition to 
the policy or action of the authorities is in hourly 
danger of arrest. But history shows that Ireland 
and her national spirit thrive on persecution. Al- 
ready this is evident again. The Volunteer move- 
ment, which Redmond tried first to suppress and 
then to split, has broken away from him, and 
under the leadership of Professor MacNeill has 
drawn into its ranks the best of the young man- 
hood of Ireland. The political machine on which 
years of effort were expended is breaking under 
the strain put upon it by the unpopularity of the 
doctrines now preached by the new loyalists, 
Redmond, Devlin and Company, and all signs 
point to the bursting forth of the old spirit of 

[208] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

opposition to England and all things English, and 
to the raising aloft of the old flag of Ireland. 

Advices received very recently prove that Eng- 
land is alarmed at the evidences of seething dis- 
content and the fact that many Nationalists are 
breaking away from John Redmond and rebelling 
against his leadership. 

The London Times (weekly edition) of De- 
cember 11, 1914, published the following news 
from Ireland: 

SEDITION IN IRELAND 



SEIZURE OF * IRISH FREEDOM 

A number of police-constables in Dublin visited 
newsvendors' shops in every district in the city on 
Thursday evening last week and seized all the copies 
on sale of the publication known as Irish Freedom. 
They also raided the offices of the paper, and seized 
all the copies there. 

The printers of the following publications, Irish 
Freedom, Sinn Fein, Ireland, the Irish Worker, the 
Irish Volunteer, and the Leader were warned that if 
they printed matter calculated to promote disaffection 
or to impair recruiting they would render themselves 
liable to trial by court-martial, and to the confiscation 
of their type and plant. 

A public meeting to protest against the action of the 

[209] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

police was held in Beresford-place, Dublin, on Sunday. 
A company of the "citizen army" of the Transport 
Workers' Union, with rifles, occupied a position in 
Liberty Hall overlooking the meeting. 

Mr. James Connolly, who presided, said that had 
the police or military tried to disperse the meeting, the 
rifles would not have been silent. He also said that 
arrangements were being made to continue the sup- 
pressed papers in another form. Speeches were made 
against Mr. Redmond and the Nationalist Party. 



John Redmond is to-day acting in harmony 
with the traditional policy of the British Govern- 
ment in Ireland. The Liberal government, with 
his tacit consent, has prohibited the Irish World 
of New York from entering Ireland, although 
the Irish World has long been his chief 
newspaper support in America and had raised 
$800,000 to sustain the party. That journal could 
not agree with the policy of recruiting advocated 
by him, and for that reason Redmond betrays 
the Irish World to the government and destroys 
its large circulation in Ireland. 

The majority section of the National Volun- 
teers who refused to follow Redmond are being 
persecuted by the government. A young man, 
employed as a salesman by a Dublin wholesale 

[210] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

grocer, was discharged by his Tory employer for 
differing with Redmond's poHcy, and writes that 
he expects to be imprisoned unless he leaves the 
country. Officers of the volunteers have been dis- 
missed from railways, breweries and insurance 
companies. Government servants, suspected of 
having similar opinions, have been dismissed. 
Houses are being searched for arms, suspected 
meetings are patrolled by armed soldiers, no re- 
volver can be sold in a hardware store unless re- 
ported, gunsmiths have to send inventories of 
their stock to the authorities. The government 
seized a lot of rifles on the way to Ireland. Thou- 
sands of letters from Americans to relatives and 
friends in Ireland are opened, and men are jailed 
daily for protesting against recruiting. 

Although the German torpedo boat sunk the 
super-dreadnaught Audacious, two months ago, 
just off the County Donegal, naturally the big 
war news event for Ireland, not an Irish news- 
paper dare print a word of the disaster. The 
British newspapers blame the "extremists" for 
the small number of Nationalists recruiting, but 
say that Redmond has done the best he could 
and is to be made a peer of the realm after the 
war. 

[211] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

The recruiting posters for the army afford' 
curious reading for the student of Irish history. 
There is one posted over the walls and bill- 
boards of County Cork. 

Men of Munster 

UP WITH 

The Irish Brigade 
All Ireland is Joining 
Are We Afraid? NO! 

The Royal Minister Fusiliers, The Royal Irish 

Regiment, Leinster Regiment and 

Connaught Rangers 

NOW recruiting — JOIN AT ONCE 

and be foremost in the fight for IRELAND 
AND FOR LIBERTY 

Mr. John Redmond, M.P., says: 

And for my part I trust and believe that the man- 
hood of Ireland will not be content only to remain at 
home waiting and watching, while other men are risk- 
ing their lives to defend their liberties. 

Mr. William O'Brien, M.P., says: 

The hour has come, every man worth his salt, 
worthy of belonging to our fighting race, has got to 
step into the fighting line. 

[212] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

Mr. Joseph Devlin, M.P., says: 

Irish Volunteers, emulate the example of your fore- 
fathers who fought in the Irish Brigade in France. I 
am proud of the 700 young National Volunteers of 
Belfast who have responded to the call of duty. 

Besides your pay, your wives, children and depend- 
ents will be cared for during your absence. 

Per Week 

Wives will receive 12/6 

Each child 2/6 

Mothers and other dependents, from 3/ to 20/ 

Disabled — The government has undertaken that any 
man permanently disabled will receive an ade- 
quate pension to recompense him for the loss he 
sustains in wage-earning capacity. 

THE PRINCIPAL CORK EMPLOYERS 
Have promised to keep your places open for you at 
the end of the war, and will also see that your family 
and dependents are as well off during your absence as 
they are at present. 

Joseph Devlin-, asking for an Irish brigade, 
like the Irish brigade of Fontenoy and Landen, 
is a spectacle of slavish submission which causes 
patriotic men to hang their heads in shame. The 
contrast between an Irish brigade, in 1915, fight- 
ing for England against the intrepid Germans, 

[213] 



THE KING, THE JCAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

always the friends of the Irish throughout the 
world, and the heroes of the Irish brigade who 
won the battle of Fontenoy, defeating the Eng- 
lish, is simply indescribable. Devlin's compari- 
son is sacrilegious enough to awaken from the 
tomb Thomas Davis, the national poet, who made 
the stirring ballad about the Franco-Irish victory 
at Fontenoy: 

O'Brien's voice is hoarse with joy, as, halting, he com- 
mands, 

"Fix bay'nets ! — Charge !" Like mountain storm rush 
on those fiery bands, 

Thin is the English column now, and faint their vol- 
leys grow. 

Yet, mustering all the strength they have, they make a 
gallant show. 

They dress their ranks upon the hill to meet that battle 
wind. 

Their bayonets the breakers' foam, — like rocks the 
men behind ! 

One volley crashes from their line, when through the 
surging smoke, 

With empty guns clutched in their hands, the headlong 
Irish broke. 

On Fontenoy, on Fontenoy, hark to that fierce huzza ! 

"Revenge ! remember Limerick ! dash down the Sassa- 
nagh !" 

Like lions leaping at the fold, when mad with hunger's 
pang, 

[214] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

Right up against the Enghsh Hne the Irish exiles 

sprang : 
Bright was their steel, 'tis bloody now, their guns are 

filled with gore, 
Through shattered ranks and severed files and tram- 
pled flags they tore. 
The English strove with desperate strength, paused, 

rallied, staggered, fled, 
The green hillside is matted close with dying and with 

dead. 
Across the plain and far away passed on that hideous 

wrack, 
While cavalier and fantassin dash in upon their track. 
On Fontenoy, on Fontenoy, like eagles in the sun, 
With bloody plumes the Irish stand, — the field is 

fought and won. 

Joseph Devlin is the boss of the Irish political 
machine. He operates the levers through the 
Ancient Order of Hibernians, w^hich is organized 
most eflfectively to control the country, the Parlia- 
mentary Party. As an organizer, Devlin is able, 
ambitious and shrew^d. He expects to become the 
real political power, in the event of Home Rule, 
and he has succeeded in placing many of his fol- 
lowers on the British payroll. The writer learned 
in Ireland that Joseph Devlin had been the most 
successful Irishman of the present generation in 

[215] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

securing employment under the British Govern- 
ment for the party workers. There are very few 
exceptions to the rule that once an Irishman gets 
on the government pay-roll it is the end of him as 
a patriotic force. The Devlin machine through- 
out Ireland operates the Ancient Order of Hi- 
bernians, which is a political organization quite 
unlike the order in America. The Hibernians 
in Ireland, under the able and shrewd manipula- 
tion of Joseph Devlin, national president, form 
an organization as practical as Tammany Hall 
and better organized. 

THE SHAN VAN VOCHT* 

O, the Germans are on the sea, 

Says the Shan Van Vocht; 
The Germans are on the sea, 

Says the Shan Van Vocht ; 
O, the Germans are in the bay, 

They'll be here without delay 
And the Orange will decay, 

Says the Shan Van Vocht. 
O, the Germans are in the bay, 

They'll be here by break of day, 
And the Orange will decay, 

Says the Shan Van Vocht. 

*A century-old song modified. 

[2l61 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

And where will they have their camp? 

Says the Shan Van Vocht. 
Where will they have their camp? 

Says the Shan Van Vocht. 
On the Curragh of Kildare, 

The boys they will be there 
With their rifles in good repair, 

Says the Shan Van Vocht. 
To the Curragh of Kildare 

The boys they will repair, 
And the leaders will be there, 

Says the Shan Van Vocht. 

Then what will the patriots do ? 

Says the Shan Van Vocht. 
What iiill the patriots do ? 

Says the Shan Van Vocht. 
What should the patriots do, 

But throw off the red and blue, 
And swear that they'll be true 

To the Shan Van Vocht? 

What should the patriots do? 

And what color will they wear? 

Says the Shan Van Vocht. 
What color will they wear? 

Says the Shan Van Vocht. 
What color should be seen 

Where our fathers' homes have been 
But their own immortal green ? 
[217] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

Says the Shan Van Vocht. 
What color should be seen? 

And will Ireland then be free? 

Says the Shan Van Vocht. 
Will Ireland then be free? 

Says the Shan Van Vocht. 
Yes ! Ireland shall be free 

From the centre to the sea ; 
Then hurrah for Liberty ! 

Says the Shan Van Vocht. 

Yes ! Ireland shall be free. 



[218] 



CHAPTER XXI 

HOW ENGLAND SERVES UP THE NEWS FOR 
THE WORLD 

John Mitchell, the grandfather of the present 
young Mayor of New York City, said that, wrong 
or right, "England has the ear of the world." 
During the first two months of the war it is esti- 
mated that 90 per cent, of the war news printed 
in average American newspapers came through 
English channels and by English press arrange- 
ments. In order to suppress news from Ger- 
many, the German cables were cut before August 
5th. A flock of British special writers appeared 
in the United States. The Germans labored 
under the disadvantage of their language in this 
strange country. The letters from their profes- 
sors and authors were poorly adapted to the 
American newspaper style and habit of reading, 
and the artists who write our wonderful head 
lines, innocently, humorously or purposely, as the 
case may be, caused them to vary in grotesque 
wordings. Then, too, the pleas were too long to 

[219] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

be read by the spoiled and impatient American 
newspaper reader.* 

One man, above all, has caused truth as to 
Germany finally to work itself clear in the light 
of reason. I refer to the achievements of Doc- 
tor Bernhard Dernburg, of Berlin, former Min- 
ister in the German Cabinet, living at present in 
New York. This man has stripped the mask of 
hypocrisy off the face of John Bull, exposed the 
falsity of his claim to be the saviour of small 
nations, and pilloried the English writers with 
proven facts and figures, which literary feats, so 
able, thorough and skilful, have captivated the 
imagination and impressed the reasoning powers 
of the thinking section of the American public. 
While the English writers for American publi- 
cations are quarrelling among themselves as to 
the causes or necessity of the war, and calling 
their opponents names or applying epithets, Dr. 
Dernburg never loses his temper, steadily aims 
and hits the bull's-eye, and is an epitome of 
the faith, steadiness and efficiency which charac- 
terizes Germany. There is a charm to his diction 

*The writer refers only to writers and publicists in Germany. 
The brilliant and effective work of Mr. Herman Ridder, editor 
of the New York Siaats Zeitung, is invaluable, likewise many 
German newspapers printed in the United States. 

[ 220 ] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

and an element of grim humor which make his 
letters seem like literary gems. He lived in New 
York for many years, where he was trained as a 
banker, and his father was owner of the Berlin 
Tageblatt. He has convinced many Americans of 
the falsity and injustice of much of the news car- 
rying London dates. This poisoning of the 
world's news during the world's struggle is grad- 
ually being resented by American journals. The 
following editorial appeared in the New York 
American of December 10, 1914; 

HOW ENGLAND MAKES AND UNMAKES 
NATIONAL REPUTATIONS 

"That acute observer of international affairs, Mr. 
Arthur Moore, sets forth very clearly one of the 
reasons for England's domination of world opinion. 
It is quite true as he points out, and as every Ameri- 
can traveler abroad notices, that the American news 
selected for publication by London papers is largely 
that of matters discreditable to us as a social organiza- 
tion — lynchings, murders, large defalcations. Con- 
gressional futilities, etc. And any man of cosmopoli- 
tan habit knows that the news we get of Continental 
Europe, through London, is equally misleading. 

It is for this reason that even in peace times The 
American maintains in Paris and Berlin its own news 
bureaus, and has its special correspondents scattered 

[221 ] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

all over Europe. While, during the existing strug- 
gle, it is fortunate in being able to present to its read- 
ers the war news gathered by the London Times and 
the London Telegraph, it supplements and corrects the 
news thus obtained by the reports of the Berlin Lokal 
Anzciger, the Paris Matin and its army of special cor- 
respondents in the theatre of war. Withal a large 
staff of editors is kept busy correcting the tendency of 
British correspondents to exalt their nation's virtues 
at the expense of the rest of the world." — Editor of 
The American. 



Mr. Arthur Moore says : 

"England has controlled the news of the world 
for more than a century. It has been her greatest 
diplomatic weapon. It has probably gained more 
for her than her huge navy and her fine army. 
More than once it has saved her from serious 
loss. 

"Not one great event but has been seen for the 
rest of the world through English eyes or told to 
the rest of the world as England wished to tell 
it. The traditional racial characteristics of each 
of us were fitted upon us by England for all the 
world to learn by heart. And the myth of "Brit- 
ish fair play" stands above all the characteriza- 

[222 ] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

tions we suffer under as the greatest masterpiece 
of them all. 



SORT OF "news'* LONDON TRANSMITS 

"Europe knows America and we misunderstand 
Europe through news bearing the London date. 
Negro burning, the Camorra, bull fights, the 
Dreyfus case, Russian Jew slaughters, pass to and 
fro as "news" through London. 

"Since the establishment of the Triple Entente, 
London remade the French character for the 
world. On the date of the Entente's beginning, 
the myth of French decadence became the miracle 
of French renaissance. From the same moment 
the "bear that walks like a man" was trans- 
formed by Dr. Dillon and a host of lesser Eng- 
lish into a simple Christian hero. 

"Every one remembers the English-told story of 
the Japanese- Russian War, that story that drove 
us mad with admiration for the Japanese, Eng- 
land's allies; that made us forget the great un- 
selfish friendship of Russia in the time of our 
own great war. From London the news poured 
into our newspapers ahvays for Japan, till we 
served as England's tool to help humiliate Rus- 

[ 223 ] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

sia by a disastrous peace and hated the Japanese 
since the next day after the treaty was signed. 

OUR PANAMA ARGUMENTS SUPPRESSED 

"Our own Panama Canal controversy with Eng- 
land is fresh in the minds of all. Our side, just 
if ever anything was just, never was heard by 
the rest of the world, scarcely was heard by us. 
In every German, French and Italian journal we 
were spoken of as a nation without honor, as 
cheats and thieves by birth and traditions, alzvays 
in dispatches from London. The facts were 
twisted and misrepresented in these London 
"news items," and interviews with every promi- 
nent man who took the English side were sent 
broadcast until even we ourselves were shaken in 
our faith in our cause. It is all over now, the 
English control of the distribution of interna- 
tional news beat us, that and nothing else. And 
it is something not to be good-naturedly for- 
gotten. 

"The menace of German militarism became 
known to the world, curiouly enough, about the 
time that the French became regenerate and the 
Russians finally "tucked in their shirts," that is, 
about the time of the formation of the Entente. 

[224] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

From that date onward till the beginning of the 
war we heard more and more of this new menace 
that had taken the place of the Slav hordes as 
the world-wide bugaboo. And it was not from 
France, but from England, that the tales of this 
new terror came. 

''When the great war broke upon the world we 
were already prepared to believe everything 
against the Germans, as we were ready to be- 
lieve everything against the Russians when they 
were fighting the Japanese, allies of England. 

A MONOPOLY OF NEWS VALUABLE 

''Newspapers do not manufacture news. They 
can only collect it from the best available sources 
and present it to their readers in the most ac- 
ceptable form. That the best available source of 
all international news is now, as it always has 
been, England, is the fault of no one. But it is 
a serious fact that ought to be realized fully and 
constantly by every man and woman who reads 
the newspapers in these times. To-day almost all 
the important news is foreign news, and it is 
news about events that are changing the whole 
world. Never before has England's monopoly 
of international news been of so tremendous a 

[225] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

value to England or so dangerous to the rest 
of the world. 

"One need not be pro-German to fear and to 
distrust the use to which England may put this 
tremendous power that she possesses; one need 
only be a little thoughtful. We may well be 
called upon as a nation to play a very important 
part in the final adjustments following this con- 
flict. And if we open-eyed fall a victim once 
more to this most powerful weapon of British 
diplomacy we may fail in playing our part in 
a manner that we may lastingly regret. Day by 
day our judgment is being undermined by this 
force in the hands of England. But knowing it 
we ought to guard against it, pro-German and 
anti-German alike, till the war is over." 

"The English mobilization of the news" is a 
phrase that exactly describes British press activ- 
ities. It has been used by an Austrian journalist, 
Mr. Rudolf Kommer. "We were intensely 
struck by the literary quality of the 'atrocity 
stories,' " says Mr. Kommer, describing his im- 
pressions of London in the first days of the war. 
"While our colleagues in Germany and Austria 
and France and Russia were admiring the over- 

[226] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

whelming features of the mobilization of the 
armies, we were exhausting ourselves in admira- 
tion for the English mobilisation of the nezus." 
The strict censorship exercised by the military 
authorities in London is merely the reverse side 
of English journalist activity. The newspaper 
readers in the British Islands have been told all 
about the insurrections in Hungary and Bohemia, 
but they have not yet heard about the sinking of 
the Audacious off the coast of Donegal east. 

However, none of the results of the war so far 
has come through and the following account of 
the prisoners of war in German hands was given 
in The Irish Times of January 7, 1915 : 

PRISONERS OF WAR IN GERMANY 

A FORMIDABLE TOTAL 

The following official statement has been issued 
from the German Chief Headquarters: 

The total number of prisoners of war interned in 
Germany, not including civilian prisoners, is 8,138 
officers and 577,475 men. 

The figures do not include a number of those taken 
prisoner in the course of the pursuit in Russian Po- 
land, nor those at present on their way to concentra- 
tion camps. The number of interned prisoners is made 
up as follows: 

[227] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

OFFICERS MEN 

French 3,459 215,505 

Russians 3,575 306,294 

Belgians 612 36,852 

British 492 18,824 

Totals 8,138 577.475 

Among the captured officers are stated to be seven 
French generals, eighteen Russian generals, and three 
Beligian generals. 

The official statement continues : The Russian state- 
ment, alleged to have been issued by the Russian War 
Minister, that 1,140 German officers and 134,700 men 
have been captured by the Russians, is incorrect, as 
the Russian figures include all civilians arrested on 
and since the outbreak of the war. The number of 
actual prisoners is not more than 15 per cent, of these 
figures. 

Mighty marvels of transformation in the ra- 
cial and national character of the Allies have 
been performed by the British journalists. And 
many of the American editors have literally swal- 
lowed these fantastic and absurd characteriza- 
tions, dated London, without giving a thought 
to history. Furnish us dispatches, false or true, 
but dispatches ! We care not who furnishes the 
news let us, but write the lurid headlines! The 

[228] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

decadent, obscene, irreligious French nation, as 
England regarded that great people not long 
since, are now passing through a period of renais- 
sance. The pathetic stories of nuns and heroic 
priests from France make us forget Viviani, the 
French premier, who said, in driving the nuns 
out of France, that he had "extinguished the 
lights in heaven." The Russians who, according 
to Kipling, were styled the "bear that walks like 
a man," are now the intrepid guardians of civili- 
zation, while the Sepoys, who were tied to and 
shot from the mouths of English cannon only 
sixty years ago, are styled "our brave and 
swarthy allies from India." 



[229] 



CHAPTER XXII 

NEW YORK PUBLIC OPINION 

The discerning and thinking American citizen 
pays little attention to the fickle thing called 
"majority of public opinion." You can travel on 
the Continent, all the way from Barcelona, Spain, 
to London, and you will see thousands of monu- 
ments erected to commemorate the memory of 
patriots, but never one was in a majority at first, 
or for most of his life. Every work of revolu- 
tion has come from a determined minority. 
George Washington, the Father of our Country, 
was at the head of a resolute minority. If he 
had failed, England would have hung him on the 
scaffold, like Emmet, as a rebel. 

Woodrow Wilson, in his "History of the 
American People," writing of the American 
Revolution, says: "It is the familiar story of 
revolution; the active and efficient concert of a 
comparatively small number at a moment of 
doubt and crisis." Garibaldi, with ten thousand 
followers clad in red shirts, united Italy and 
made a kingdom out of political fragments. The 

[230] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

immortal Robert Emmet mustered no more than 
a few thousand followers, but his name is ven- 
erated, and his short life commemorated more 
than any other in Ireland's long and pathetic 
history. 

New York City is to-day the stronghold of 
Toryism and English snobbery, as it was in the 
days of George Washington and Abraham Lin- 
coln. In the dark days of 1776 and of 1861 the 
so-called "public opinion" of New York and the 
newspapers of the city opposed the national and 
patriotic cause. Washington distrusted the New 
York City merchant class. In 1861 Abraham 
Lincoln was caricatured as an ape by the metro- 
politan press, inspired by London. For fifteen 
decades the New York City newspapers, or the 
majority of them, have been led in international 
politics, and in the world's business, by London. 
Their real influence in the United States is small, 
and steadily receding in the West, which controls 
the country in public affairs. The favor of certain 
New York City newspapers is disastrous to all 
national aspirants for public honors. The dele- 
gation from New York State, the largest, is the 
most impotent in Congress. The voice of New 
York City is local and does not even control the 

[231 ] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

commonwealth of the State of New York — to 
say nothing of the United States of America. 
The Irish emigrants of New York in 1776 were 
the first to enroll in the Revolution, and George 
Washington became a member of the first Irish 
Revolutionary society in New York, the Sons of 
Saint Patrick. Without the support of the Irish, 
the colony of New York would not have em- 
braced the American Constitution. When the 
Declaration of Independence was submitted, New 
York was loyal to England. Thomas Jefferson 
announced his distrust of New York. George 
Washington, satisfied of the devotion of Phila- 
delphia and Boston, determined that he would 
transfer his headquarters to New York, and re- 
lied on the intrepid Irish patriots for support. 
He took charge of a hostile commonwealth (see 
Woodrow Wilson's "History of the American 
People," page 243, Vol. 2). There were enough 
Tory sympathizers to lose him New York, and 
fearing treachery on the part of the residents, 
Washington retreated from New York in the fall 
of 1776. "These are the times that try men's 
souls," said Thomas Paine in December, 1776. 
Confident of New York, the British followed 
Washington to the Delaware. The soldiers of 

[232] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

Washington were starving when 1,800 Irish rifle- 
men reached him from New York, and the Sons 
of Saint Patrick sent him $24,000 in gold. This 
brought his force up to 7,200 fighting men. The 
English army in America was then 18,000 
troops. The year before, the first general to die 
was Richard Montgomery, friend of Washing- 
ton, native of Raphoe, Ireland. 

The year 1777 was a terrible year for George 
Washington. He was outnumbered, betrayed, 
his troops were freezing and starving, and Brit- 
ish gold controlled New York. The English had 
hired the Hessian mercenaries to fight, when, 
according to Woodrow Wilson, historian, "as the 
year drew to its close the great Frederick of 
Prussia had forbidden troops hired in the other 
German states to cross Prussian territory to 
serve the English in America." Valley Forge is 
the Limerick of America. The English hired 
the savage Mohawk Indians to destroy the wives 
and children of the American colonists. France 
took the side of America because she was at war 
with England on the Continent. Paul Jones bom- 
barded English ports in 1779, and 116 years later 
(1915) the Germans are firing on the same Eng- 
lish cities. The English bought Benedict Arnold 
away from George Washington by the promise 

[233 ] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

of high office, exactly as the English Government 
of 1914 has bought John Redmond, the Irish 
leader, by the promise of office under the local 
Home Rule Bill. 

The treason of Benedict Arnold is recorded in 
his pass to Major Andre, the British spy, Septem- 
ber 22, 1780, which read: "Permit Mr. John 
Anderson to pass to White Plains on business." 
I cannot help thinking that the prospect of high 
office under the local Home Rule bill has been all 
persuasive in inducing John Redmond to adopt 
a course that will lead to many friends of Ireland 
comparing him to Benedict Arnold. 

Let Erin remember the days of old, 

'Ere her faithless sons betrayed her, 

When Malachi wore the collar of gold, 

Which he won from her proud invader, 

When her Kings with standard of green unfurled 

Led the Red Branch Knights to danger, 

'Ere the emerald gem of the western world 

Was set in the crown of the Stranger. 

The sons and descendants of the Celts and the 
Gaels, throughout the imperial commonwealth of 
New York, have repudiated the treachery of 
Redmond to the cause of "Ireland a Nation." In 
the largest halls of New York, Carnegie Hall, 
Terrace Garden, the Academy of Music in Brook- 

[234] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

lyn, vast multitudes have gathered to denounce 
the betrayal of the national cause. The women 
have vied with the men in the enthusiasm of their 
gatherings. The Sons of Ulster, Leinster, Mun- 
ster and Connaught, through their brotherhood 
of county societies, representing practically all 
the men of New York who have ever done any- 
thing for Ireland, have voiced the true feeling. 
The fourth of March, 1915, the anniversary of 
the martyr — Robert Emmet — is near at hand. 
Hundreds of meetings are under way for that 
day. All will extend sympathy and encourage- 
ment to our German friends and neighbors. True 
Nationalists have been taught for generations 
that in England's emergency will be found the 
sole opportunity for the liberty of Ireland. 

On August 18, 1914, President Wilson ad- 
dressed to the American people a powerful appeal 
in behalf of a broad neutrality. In "The White 
Papers," republished from the New York Times, 
an able and influential newspaper, the following 
copy of the proclamation appears : 

I suppose that every thoughtful man in America has 
asked himself during the last troubled weeks what in- 
fluence the European war may exert upon the United 
States, and I take the liberty of addressing a few 

[235] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

words to you in order to point out that it is entirely 
within our own choice what its effects upon us will be 
and to urge very earnestly upon you the sort of speech 
and conduct which will best safeguard the nation 
against distress and disaster. 

The effect of the war upon the United States will 
depend upon what American citizens say or do. Every 
man who really loves America will act and speak in 
the true spirit of neutrality, which is the spirit of im- 
partiality and fairness and friendliness to all con- 
cerned. The spirit of the nation in this critical matter 
will be determined largely by what individuals and 
society and those gathered in public meetings do and 
say, upon what newspapers and magazines contain, 
upon what our ministers utter in their pulpits and men 
proclaim as their opinions on the streets. 

The people of the United States are drawn from 
many nations, and chiefly from the nations now at 
war. It is natural and inevitable that there should 
be the utmost variety of sympathy and desire among 
them with regard to the issues and circumstances of 
the conflict. Some will wish one nation, others an- 
other to succeed in the momentous struggle. It will 
be easy to excite passion and difficult to allay it. Those 
responsible for exciting it will assume a heavy re- 
sponsibility ; responsibility for no less a thing than that 
the people of the United States, whose love of their 
country and whose loyalty to its Government should 
unite them as Americans all, bound in honor and af- 
fection to think first of her and her interests, may be 
divided in camps of hostile opinions, hot against each 

[236] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

other, involved in the war itself in impulse and opin- 
ion, if not in action. Such diversions among us would 
be fatal to our peace of mind and might seriously 
stand in the way of the proper performance of our 
duty as the one great nation at peace, the one people, 
holding itself ready to play a part of impartial media- 
tion and speak the counsels of peace and accommoda- 
tion, not as a partisan, but as a friend. 

I venture, therefore, my fellow-countrymen, to 
speak a solemn word of warning to you against that 
deepest, most subtle, most essential breach of neutral- 
ity which may spring out of partisanship, out of pas- 
sionately taking sides. The United States must be neu- 
tral in fact as well as in name during these days that 
are to try men's souls. We must be impartial in 
thought as well as in action, must put a curb upon our 
sentiments as well as upon ever transaction that might 
be construed as a preference of one party to the strug- 
gle before another. 

My thought is of America. I am speaking, I feel 
sure, the earnest wish and purpose of every thoughtful 
American that this great country of ours, which is, 
of course, the first in our thoughts and in our hearts, 
should show herself in this time of peculiar trial a na- 
tion fit beyond others to exhibit the fine poise of undis- 
turbed judgment, the dignity of self-control, the effi- 
ciency of dispassionate action, a nation that neither 
sits in judgment upon others nor is disturbed in her 
own counsels, and which keeps herself fit and free to 
do what is honest and disinterested and truly service- 
able for the peace of the world. 

[237] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

Shall we not resolve to put upon ourselves the re- 
straint which will bring to our people the happiness 
and the great and lasting influence for peace we covet 
for them? 

WooDRow Wilson. 

Although six months have passed, we find the 
New York Times one of the most flagrant daily 
violators of the President's admonition. A sample 
of the Times' "neutrality" may be noticed in an 
editorial of February 10, 1915. The Times says: 

The chief moral superstition in Germany to-day is 
that concerning divine right. The future of the Ger- 
man people is being sacrificed to that exploded notion. 
Six months of war with no result save "calumnies and 
hatred and bitter hostility everywhere" is enough to 
dishearten the German soldiers and the German peo- 
ple. There have been other results — Germany has 
brought upon itself not alone the condemnation of 
the civilized world outside, but sore distress and priva- 
tion within the Empire. The proofs of it are too nu- 
merous to be ignored, and they are multiplying rapidly. 
Germany is like an invested fortress. 

Then follow^s a long and labored article show- 
ing that the Allies are winning the war and that 
German victory is impossible. All this notwith- 
standing the fact that Germany has won all of the 
greatest battles in the war thus far, holds all of 

[238] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

Belgium, a considerable section of France and 
Russia, and has electrified the world with her 
naval exploits. The New York Herald indulges 
daily in the most venomous cartoons directed at 
Germany. Mr. Joseph Choate, former Ambassa- 
dor to Great Britain, and former President Eliot, 
of Harvard College, vie with the English pub- 
licists now visiting the United States in literary 
efforts aimed at the destruction of Germany and 
the triumph of England. We have waited pa- 
tiently for six months before launching this much- 
needed book, which represents a vast and grow- 
ing American public opinion, and much as we 
regret to have the appearance of disregarding the 
plea of our President for neutrality, to all fair- 
minded men the facts contained in this work are 
very necessary in order to offset the unneutral 
propagandas. 



[239] 



CHAPTER XXIII 

IRISH OPINION IN SOUTH AMERICA 

The sons of the Irish emigrants expatriated to 
the tropics and south of the equator are not de- 
ceived by the appeal of John Redmond to save 
Ireland from the ruthless German invaders. The 
Irish in South America and the West Indies, 
while not numerous, are important, and they are 
usually men of standing and exercise a good in- 
fluence on their neighbors. The Irish mission 
priests are noted for their bravery, intrepidity 
and skill in handling the natives. After the 
famine of 1847 in Ireland many peasants reached 
the coasts of South America and settled on the 
pampas land of Argentine or in Brazil, Chile, 
Peru and along the Caribbean Sea. The sons of 
these men have heard the story of England from 
the lips of their fathers. A considerable number 
of Irish emigrants married natives or women of 
mixed blood, and it is curious to meet black, 
brown and olive-skinned men bearing the names 
O'Brien, Donnelly, Brady, O'Callihan, O'Hara, 
Maloney, McDonnell, O'Ryan and Delehanty, 

[240] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

speaking Spanish or Portuguese with a tincture 
of Irish brogue. The oldest Irish families are 
located on the Pacific Coast side of the Continent, 
mostly in Peru and Chile, although the last 
twenty-five years have brought more Irish emi- 
grants to the east coast of South America. They 
form important colonies in the towns, and a num- 
ber raise sheep, cattle and coffee in the interior. 
They are not fooled by lies about the Germans, 
like their countrymen in Ireland, where there are 
not more than 500 Germans in the island; but 
in the tropics the Irish resident knows the Ger- 
man as the most thorough and efficient of indi- 
viduals, and the type to be studied and followed. 
In the West Indies he saw the jealousies excited 
in the British colonies by the success of the Ger- 
man salesmen, bankers, and merchants gradually 
overpowering the English traders. He witnessed 
the Hamburg-American lines gradually forcing 
out the English steamships in the first-class 
steamship cargo, tourist and passenger business 
throughout the tropics and in the West Indies, 
where even the colonists of the English posses- 
sion, Jamaica, preferred the German boats to 
Hayti and Porto Rica. Your emigrant in the 
Latin-American countries knows only too well 

[241 ] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

the superiority of the Germans in the world-wide 
commercial struggle. Consequently he is not car- 
ried off his feet by scare headlines in the Amer- 
ican, English and Irish newspapers now flooding 
the tropics. He sees all the colonists at close 
range, he has his country and her history before 
him, and that is why most all of the Irish in the 
West Indies, Central America and South Amer- 
ica are outspoken in their opposition to recruiting 
Irishmen to fight England's battle and save her 
from decline as a world power. 

Argentina, with a population of 5,000,000, is 
the most important country in South America, 
that is, the most prosperous, and contains the fin- 
est city in the New World, Buenos Ayres, second 
only to New York in grandeur, the Paris of the 
Continent. The leading newspaper in South 
America, printed in English, devoted to the Na- 
tionalist Irish movement, is the Southern Cross 
of Buenos Ayres, well printed, widely circulated 
and of international interest. This journal repre- 
sents the views of the Irish who live in the tropics 
or south of the equator. This periodical reaches 
the United States, where it is frequently quoted 
as a unique proof that a paper printed in English, 
devoted to Ireland, of rare literary value, can 

[242] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

exist in Argentina. The following opinions of 
the Southern Cross is the real view of the Latin- 
American Celts: 

"WILL IRELAND BE FALSE TO HERSELF?" 

"Ireland would he false to her history and to every 
consideration of honor, good faith, and self-interest if 
she sent her children to die on foreign battlefields, 
fighting the battles of the stranger." 

*'John Redmond, leader of the Irish Parlia- 
mentary Party, has issued the following mani- 
festo : 

The whole-hearted endorsement by the Irish peo- 
ple and the Irish Volunteers of the spirit of my decla- 
ration, made on the impulse of the moment, and with- 
out seeking for any conditions whatever, that the de- 
fence of Ireland might safely be left to the sons of 
Ireland themselves, shows the profound change which 
has been brought about in the relations of Ireland to 
the empire by the events of the past three years. 

"We Irish all agree that the defence of Ire- 
land ought to be left to the sons of Ireland; but 
the British do not agree to it and so do not leave 
the defence of Ireland to the Irish. 

"The Irish people know, and appreciate the 
fact fully, that, at last, after centuries of misun- 

[243] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

derstanding, the democracy of Great Britain has 
finally and irrevocably decided to trust them, and 
to give them back their national liberties. By 
overwhelming British majorities a charter of 
liberty for Ireland has been three times passed 
by the House of Commons. A new era, it ap- 
pears, has opened in the history of the two na- 
tions. 

"IRELAND GETS LITTLE MORE THAN A PROMISE 
OF HER rights" 

"The question is not whether the British democ- 
racy trusts the Irish, but whether the Irish can 
trust them. It is false that the British democ- 
racy has finally and irrevocably decided to give 
the Irish their national liberties — as yet we have 
got nothing. Even the paltry and meagre Home 
Rule Bill can be revoked at any moment ; and in 
any case an amending bill will be brought for- 
ward before the law is put into execution. More- 
over, by this Home Rule Bill Ireland does not 
come into her national liberties; she gets little 
more than a promise of the rights that any camp 
municipality enjoys in this country. 

"The Home Rule Bill was not passed by an 
overwhelming British majority; if it depended 

[ 244 1 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

solely on the British vote, it would not have 
passed; it was the Irish vote that pulled it 
through. 

**Mr. Redmond further states: 
During the long discussion of the Irish problem in 
Parliament and on the platform we promised the Brit- 
ish people that the concession of liberty would have 
the same effect in Ireland as in every other part of 
the empire, and notably in recent years in South 
Africa, that disaffection would give way to friendship 
and good will, and that Ireland would become a 
strength, instead of a weakness, to the empire. The 
democracy of Great Britain listened to our appeal, 
and have kept faith with Ireland. It is now a duty 
of honor for Ireland to keep faith with them. 

"Why should Mr. Redmond make these prom- 
ises ? Who authorized him to do so ? When did 
British democracy keep faith with Ireland? and 
when and where did Ireland promise them any- 
thing ? One would think by the manner in which 
Mr. Redmond puts it, that Ireland had no right 
to demand Home Rule, that this was a gratuitous 
gift on the part of the British Empire. 

'The Home Rule Bill does not grant to Ireland 
the liberties enjoyed by other parts of the empire, 
such as Canada, Australia, South Africa, etc. 

"Mr. Redmond makes special reference to 
[245] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

South Africa, where, according to him, disaffec- 
tion gave way to friendship and good will. 

"Mr. Redmond's assertions have been disproved 
by facts. At the present moment a great part 
of Transvaal and of the Orange State is up in 
arms against the British Empire. General De- 
larey, who opposed the war against Germany, 
was assassinated in Pretoria. By whom? Gen- 
eral Delarey was one of the heroes of the Boer 
War and was very popular all over South Africa. 

"Mr. Redmond said also : 

A test to search men's souls has arisen. The em- 
pire is engaged in the most serious war in history. 
It is a just war, provoked by the intolerable military 
despotism of Germany. It is a war for the defence 
of the sacred rights and liberties of small nations, and 
the respect and enlargement of the great principle of 
nationality. Involved in it is the fate of France, our 
kindred country, the chief nation of that powerful 
Celtic race to which we belong; the fate of Belgium, 
to whom we are attached by the same great ties of 
race, and by the common desire of a small nation to 
assert its freedom ; and the fate of Poland, whose suf- 
ferings and whose struggle bear so marked a resem- 
blance to our own. 

It is a war for high ideals of human government 
and international relations, and Ireland would be false 
to her history, and to every consideration of honor, 

[ 246 1 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

good faith, and self-interest, did she not wilhngly bear 
her share in its burdens and its sacrifices. We have, 
even when no ties of sympathy bound our country to 
Great Britain, always given our quota, and more than 
our quota, to the firing-line, and we shall do so now. 

Words, words. If the empire is at war it should 
fight its own battles. Mr. Redmond says the 
war is just, but the Irish people do not know, nor 
have they sufficient elements at their disposal to 
pronounce judgment on the justice or causes of 
the war. We feel for France and for Belgium 
and hope that Poland may obtain her own. One 
thing we know, that the Poles, if they cannot ob- 
tain freedom, would prefer to be under Austria 
than under Russia, the ally of England. 

''Ireland would be false indeed to her history, 
and to every consideration of honor, good faith 
and self-interest if she sent her children to die on 
foreign battlefields fighting the battles of the 
stranger in a war that she has neither provoked 
nor knows anything about. Those who have 
brought on and declared this war should fight it 
out. Whenever Ireland has made war, her sons 
have been men enough to do the fighting ; they did 
not remain at home and ask the stranger to do it 
for them. 

[247] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

Ireland is not alone in this way of thinking. 
The Argentine Republic, Brazil, Chile and all the 
Latin-American Republics, the United States, 
Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Holland, Switzer- 
land, Italy, Spain, Greece, etc., have decided to 
take no sides in this war. Why does not Mr. 
Redmond appeal to the sympathy of those strong 
nations, instead of seeking to deprive Ireland of 
the few children that remain to comfort and help 
her in her hour of need? 

"The Swiss Government was advised by one of 
the belligerent powers to protest against Germany 
for violating Belgian neutrality. The answer 
was swift and curt : "Switzerland has enough to 
do to defend her own neutrality." 

"no irishman should ever enlist in Eng- 
land's service" 

"Mr. Redmond says that the Irish fought be- 
fore for Great Britain. The most of those who did 
so had enlisted in the British army before war, 
and therefore were forcibly obliged to go, but in 
any case if some Irish were fooled once it does 
not follow that they should always be fooled. No 
Irishman should ever enlist in the British army 
in time of peace or war ; that is our principle, and 

[248I 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

it is the principle of every true Irishman from 
O'Neill to Parnell. 

"Mr. Redmond further says: 

We have a right, however, to claim that Irish re- 
cruits for the Expeditionary Force should be kept to- 
gether as a unit, officered as far as possible by Irish- 
men, composed, if possible, of county battalions, to 
form, in fact, an "Irish Brigade," so that Ireland may 
gain national credit for their deeds, and feel, like 
other communities of the empire, that she, too, has 
contributed an army bearing her name in this his- 
toric struggle. 

Simultaneously with the formation of this Irish 
Brigade, for service abroad, our volunteers must be 
put in a state of efficiency as speedily as practicable, 
for the defence of the country. In this way, by the 
time the war ends, Ireland will possess an army of 
which she may be proud. I feel certain that the 
young men of our country will respond to this appeal 
with the gallantry of their race. 

The British, or, if Mr. Redmond wishes, the 
Imperial Government, has not consented to grant 
this right. This confirms what we say, that the 
Irish should not enlist for service in this war. 

"let irishmen learn and beware" 
"If the youth of Ireland pay heed to Mr. Red- 
mond, acting as recruiting sergeant for the Brit- 

[249] 



( 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

ish Government, then at the end of the war Ire- 
land will have lost the flower of her children, who 
will have died not for their mother, but for the 
stranger in a foreign land. This is not guess- 
work. When war was declared, 600 Irishmen 
of the Dublin Fusiliers were sent to the front. 
One month after a war-worn band of 42 re- 
turned to Dublin. Those 42 were the remnant 
of the 600 Irish Fusiliers. The majority died on 
the battlefield, or remained in the hospitals, in- 
valids for life. Let Irishmen learn and beware 
of enlisting. 

"Mr. Redmond said in conclusion: 

I would appeal to our countrymen of a different 
creed and of opposite political opinion, to accept the 
friendship we have so consistently offered them ; to al- 
low this great war, as to which their opinions and ours 
are the same, and our action will also be the same, to 
swallow up all the small issues in the domestic gov- 
ernment of Ireland which now divide us; that as our 
soldiers are going to fight, to shed their blood, and 
to die at each other's side, in the same army, against 
the same enemy, and for the same high purpose, their 
union in the field may lead to a union in their home, 
and that their blood may be the seal that will bring 
all Ireland together in one nation, and in liberties equal 
and common to all. 

[250] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

"Ireland needs all her sons of every creed and 
of every political opinion. And we say to all: 
Do not fight other people's wars ; remain at home 
and build up a strong and free Ireland. There 
is work for all in that dear Ireland whose honor 
has been handed down untarnished through the 
ages into the hands of the present generation. 

"We understand that Mr. Redmond is consid- 
ered a great orator. In this manifesto he lacks 
many of the great qualities of a thinker. He is 
vague and colorless. His aim is that Irishmen 
should go to Europe to fight for England, but he 
does not say this openly; he speaks about our 
sympathy for France, Belgium and Poland and 
gives no fundamental reason for appealing to the 
Irish people to fight the stranger's battles. He 
does not explain why, not counting the colonies, 
eight million Englishmen of an age and capacity 
to bear arms remain at home without thinking 
of going to fight for their country. 

"shall IRELAND DIE A DEATH OF INFAMY AND 
DEGRADATION ?" 

"The reading of this manifesto was not merely 
a painful surprise, but we felt in our heart a 
sense of loss, of betrayal. It struck us forcibly 

[251] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

that neither Owen Roe O'Neill, O'Donnell, 
Theobald Wolfe Tone, Robert Emmet, nor any 
of those great men who lived or died for Ireland 
would ever have signed such a document. If 
Ireland cannot hold her own (and she can) she 
should die with honor, as gallant nations die. 
Ireland should not die a death of infamy and 
degradation. 

"Was it for this that during centuries Ireland 
suffered and labored? Was it for this our 
women and children died of starvation, or were 
brutally murdered or had to flee to distant lands? 
Was it for this that Irishmen fought in Ireland 
and in every battlefield in Europe? 

"If this be the result, then Ireland's martyrdom, 
Ireland's sufferings, Ireland's aspirations, have 
been in vain; it would have been better for her 
if, at the beginning, she had prostrated herself 
on the ground and meekly allowed herself to be 
trampled on by the Sassenach. But, thank God, 
the result is not this. Irishmen and Irishwomen 
will rise in their anger and reject this solution. 
Redmond's day is done; he got the chance of 
being a great man, but has failed." 

From other sections of South America, where 
Irish residents are heard from, the repudiation of 

[252] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

Redmond's leadership continues. In Santiago, 
the capital of Chile, the Irish society gathered 
near the famous equestrian statute of O'Higgins 
and denounced the plan for the betrayal of the 
cause of Irish freedom. There are few greater 
names in South American history than O'Hig- 
gins, both father and son. 

The first O'Higgins was born in County 
Meath, Ireland, in 1720, died in Lima, Peru, in 
1810. He was first a peddler in Argentina. Then 
he built roads and became an engineer. For 
twelve years he was Governor of Chile and for 
some years Viceroy of Peru. His son, Bernard 
O'Higgins, died at Lima, Peru, in 1842. He led 
a successful revolution against Spain and was 
made President of Chile. A revolution over- 
threw his Government in 1823 and he was driven 
into exile in Peru. His ashes were brought back 
with great honors by the Chilean Government and 
his statue is the most imposing one in Santiago. 
His son, Demetris, died in 1869, and was a con- 
tributor to the young Ireland movement of 1848. 
Bernard O'Higgins is conceded to have been the 
ablest Chilean administrator. 

The most important line of steamers to the 
west coast are the Grace ships, the head of the 

[253] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

firm of brothers being the late Mayor of 
New York, William R. Grace, of Cork, County 
Cork, Ireland. He lived in Peru in his early days 
and contributed liberally to Irish famine and 
national funds. Mr. Grace found institutes in 
America and in Peru for the free business train- 
ing of poor boys and girls. 

Irish colonists, citizens and societies have met 
in Cuba, Mexico, Porto Rico, and in the cities of 
Rio Janeiro, Bahia, Sao Paulo, and Callao, and 
condemned the vilification and misrepresentation 
of the German people by England. The fathers 
of many of these men were impressed by the 
English merchantmen and intended by the con- 
querors to practically make slaves of them in the 
West Indies by hypothecating the proceeds of 
their wretched labor after the dread famine of 
1847, when the starving people welcomed the first 
ship, for no matter where, so long as it departe'd 
from stricken Ireland. It was in one of those 
fateful years that the cruel London Times, now 
appealing for Irish army recruits, commenting on 
the exodus from Ireland, crowding into the holds 
of sailing ships for the terrible voyage across the 
seas, gloatingly said: "The Celt is gone — ^gone 
with a vengeance. The Celt will soon be as rare 

[254] 




MICHAEL DAVITT 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

on the banks of the Shannon as the Red Indian 
on the banks of the Hudson." 

The exiles, scattered to the four corners of the 
earth, more numerous and powerful than the rem- 
nants of Erin's isle, form the terrible Nemesis 
dogging the trail of John Bull, exposing his 
hypocrisy and preventing him from having the 
ear of the world. 



[255] 



CHAPTER XXIV 

IRISH FEELING FAVORS GERMANY 

The true facts as to the state of Ireland are grad- 
ually being seen by observing Americans. And 
the feelings of those in America, who have ever 
really served the cause of Ireland, are manifestly 
for Germany in all parts of the United States. 

Irish- Americans admire the Germans not alone 
because of our inveterate dislike of England, as 
is charged, but because we have learned to love 
the Germans as the best friends of Irish freedom 
in America. Through their societies, press, sing- 
ing clubs and athletic bodies, they have mani- 
fested the deepest sympathies for our cause. 
Without their aid we could not have defeated the 
dangerous Anglo-American treaties in the United 
States Senate, as submitted by that arch-enemy of 
Irish nationality, Joseph Choate, former ambas- 
sador to England. 

Of German blood in this country there are 
some 16,000,000, and nearly as many of Irish ex- 
traction — four times as great as all the inhabi- 
tants of Ireland. 

[256] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

The war news is unreliable because most all 
of it is dated from hostile sources — London, 
Paris and St. Petersburg. A kindly people, of 
high ideals, who have kept the peace of the world 
for forty years, when all other nations went to 
war, including our country, are set down in the 
news bureaus of the world as vile barbarians, 
cruel vandals, and destroyers of all things sacred 
in religion and art. Not all Americans are so 
credulous, for gradually thought is working itself 
clear in spite of misrepresentations as to Ger- 
many. 

The present writer visited Ireland just before 
and for some time after the war. All the press 
dispatches in the Irish papers emanate from Lon- 
don. Much of the printed matter is "fake stuff," 
designed to gain recruits in the British army from 
the unwilling Irish. In the Hotel Gresham, Dub- 
lin, he chanced to see some notes of "German 
atrocities," a description of the "shooting of Sis- 
ters of Mercy by the German troops, the wilful 
killing of priests and sacrilege of sacred altars." 
This was printed in various Irish papers by a 
scoundrel who made it up in the Dublin hotel. 

The writer had long been a strong supporter 
of Redmond, since the death of Parnell in 1895, 

[2571 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

and had given him the support of his papers, but 
his eyes were quickly opened in Ireland. Red- 
mond's machine is like any other political machine 
— in search of power and offices. The present 
government has largely contributed to that end. 
The Irish Party has lost its youth and vitality 
largely, and its usefulness was ended with the 
Land Act, which has worked well for Ireland. The 
social atmosphere of London is bad for good- 
intentioned patriots who fall for the social and 
commercial set who entertain and patronize them. 

The time is ripe in Ireland for an uprising 
against the weak, compromising West British 
leaders who accepted a measure which will give 
them a few hundred local offices, if it ever does 
become a law, and who refuse to continue the 
struggle for liberty and nationhood. But Red- 
mond is not another Robert Emmet or a Wolfe 
Tone. In spite of leaders, party, press and Brit- 
ish power and gold, the recruiting in Ireland is a 
failure up to date. 

We all know in this country that the Cathe- 
dral of Rheims was not destroyed, and the Amer- 
ican press correspondents have told us the true 
story of Louvain. Friends of Redmond on this 
side are shocked at the shamelessness of his re- 

[258] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

cruiting speeches. The present writer submits 
the following stenographic report of a recent re- 
cruiting speech by Redmond, made in his home 
towa of Waterford, appealing to the lads from 
the farms to go over and kill the Germans for 
England. He said : 

"You must emulate the glory of the Volunteers 
of 1778 and 1782 and safeguard the Irish nation 
against the incoming Teutonic barbarian hordes. 
The work of recruiting has lagged and I am here 
to say that you are wanting in spirit. I have 
secured in Parnell Square suitable buildings 
where you vigorous young men will repair, and 
where you will be provided with arms and drill- 
ing instructors. I have started a new paper to 
oppose the Irish National Volunteer. I am put- 
ting in your hands to use against the Germans, 
the latest pattern rifles. I selected these rifles 
myself as the best suited for you after consult- 
ing the board of military experts. You will have 
the best weapons in the world. I have ordered 
the Norris tubes to put inside your rifles. I have 
just received another $30,000 from friends. The 
liberty of every Irishman is in peril if the Ger- 
mans win the war. Have you become a degen- 
erate race, funking in this war, refusing to en- 

[259] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

list, showing the white feather, proving your- 
selves cowards, for the first time in your history 
while the enemies of our religion are destroying 
the sacred altars, cathedrals and priests of our 
faith? Our heroic defenders of Ireland are led 
by an Irishman (Lord Kitchener), aye, bravely 
indeed have died on the battlefields of 1914 the 
boys from Tipperary, Waterford, Cork, Ros- 
common, Dublin and Wexford. I regret to see 
that the emigration of our young people again, 
and I say it mournfully, has set in to America. 
This is no time for deserters. To fight the Ger- 
man Huns and vandals, destroyers of our sacred 
churches, most effectively, we shall organize 
Irish brigades, officered by Irishmen." 

If, as my correspondent writes, a thrill of hor- 
ror passed through the breasts of many a reader 
of Irish newspapers, how shocking to those of us 
in America who have followed Redmond and 
know the good qualities of our German neighbors. 
There is a deep undercurrent of opposition among 
many young men, like the spirit of resentment 
which existed in Ireland during the Boer war. 
The censored press will not be able to keep from 
Ireland the news of the rebellion in the Transvaal, 
the Orange Free State and Cape Colony, or the 

[260] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

mutinies of Egypt or India and the failure to 
secure Irish troops from Canada and Australia. 

Few Irishmen dare speak out from their hearts 
because of the fear of being imprisoned. But 
there are men in the Emerald Isle who dare to 
speak out and warn their countrymen against 
race suicide by recruiting and who refuse to be- 
lieve the lies about Germany. They know that \ 
a war of aggression, on the part of denuded Ire- ) 
land, for England, against Germany, has no war- 
rant in their sad history, no justification in morals 
or practical benefits. They feel sorry for poor, 
stricken Belgium, but for every claimed atrocity 
in Belgium they can ofifer a thousand proven 
parallels. They have but to glance across their 
country and see the ruins of a thousand shrines, 
wrecked cathedrals, priests hunted down like 
wolves. Redmond's appeal for troops in Wex- \ 
ford. Limerick and Drogheda, for England, / 
might have well awakened the tombs of those ^ 
towns where lay the bones of many women and 
children massacred by the English conquerors. 
For the broken treaty of any country we offer the 
treaty of Limerick and the memory of Patrick 
Sarsfield. In spite of all suppression, the real 
voice of the patriots of Ireland has found expres- 

[261] 



THE KING. THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

sion in the Dublin Leader, Irish National Volun- 
teer, Roscommon Herald, The Kerryman, Wick- 
low People, Meath Chronicle, Galway Pilot, Mayo 
News, Leitrim Observer, Sligo Champion, and 
Leinster Leader. 

Now that the Roman Catholic bishops of Ger- 
many and others have exposed the efforts of the 
EngHsh to make the Irish hate the Germans, over 
false stories of atrocities in Belgium, and have 
been able by letter to inform the prelates of Ire- 
land on the subject, a reaction has set in against 
Redmond as the principal author of these stories, 
and Cardinal Logue, primate of all Ireland, and 
Bishop O'Donnell of Raphoe, have greatly modi- 
fied opinion on the alleged atrocities, and have 
stated they distrusted England in the promises of 
Home Rule. The bill as it stands is a feeble 
measure which would be laughed out of existence 
if offered any State in this country. Our terri- 
tory of Alaska will be more free than Ireland 
under its purely local legislature. 

POWER OF PUBLIC OPINION IN THE UNITED STATES 

Students of Irish social phenomena have esti- 
mated that the sons and daughters of little Ire- 
land have sent home, across the seas, anywhere 

[262] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

from $125,000,000 to $200,000,000 in the past 
seventy years. Ireland is the only country in 
the world denuded of its population. She had 
9,000,000 in 1844 and only 4,000,000 now. But 
her emigrants mother large families. There are 
of Irish blood 13,000,000 in the United States, 
1,500,000 in Canada, 1,200,000 in Australia, 
2,000,000 in England, and many in Scotland, 
West Indies, South America and India. The 
island, poor, with few industries and little land for 
the people, received help from the exiles wherever 
settled. There is not an Irish family in America 
but can remember the times when the earnings 
on this side were shared with the less fortunate 
on the other side. In some parts of Ireland there 
is only one male left of each family. To this day 
the Christmas gifts and money going to Ireland 
is the wonder of the post-offices of the world. 
One who has been on a ship near Christmas never 
forgets the sight of the Irish mail. 

The Dublin Freeman of December 26, 1914, 
writing of the Christmas mail from America, 
stated: "Yesterday there was dealt with the 
biggest American mail that has ever had to be 
handled by the post-office. In the mail were 5,700 
American money orders at an average value of 

[263] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

$10 each. The record was made for the heavi- 
est parcel mail received from America." 

From charity to gifts for Ireland, a nation, 
has been an easy step. Millions have gone over for 
famine funds, evicted tenants, schools, churches, 
asylums, Land League, United Irish League, rev- 
olutionary movements, secret societies, monu- 
ments, patriotic and volunteer funds. 

One newspaper in New York, the Irish World, 
has collected upward of $1,000,000 for Irish na- 
tional movements in the past forty years. Until 
recently the funds to support the Parliamentary 
Party of '85 in the British House of Commons 
came from outside of Ireland. 

Steadily the sentiment against Redmond's re- 
cruiting programme is mounting in America. His 
use of the last $30,000 sent him from Amer- 
ica (the donors never dreaming their money was 
to be used for the benefit of a recruiting organi- 
zation) has disgusted all the real Nationalists, and 
the day has passed when he will hope to get 
money from the old friends of the cause he has 
weakened. The only class of Irishmen support- 
ing him, aside from a few, are those who are 
not informed, who think Home Rule is a real- 
ity, or others who are Anglo-American Tories at 

[264] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

heart, and some well-meaning clergymen, who 
cannot look away from Belgium to see the good 
that might come to Ireland with the vanishing 
power of England. 

The largest and wealthiest Irish society in 
America is the Ancient Order of Hibernians with 
several hundred thousand members. This so- 
ciety owns a newspaper in Washington, The Hi- 
bernian, which has a larger circulation in Amer- 
ica than the eight leading papers in Ireland. 
That journal, as an official organ, in its annual 
report, quotes from the official letter of Joseph 
McLaughlin of Philadelphia, who is national 
president of the Order. President McLaughlin 
says: 

'The status of the Volunteer movement in Ire- 
land has aroused some curiosity, and I have re- 
ceived many inquiries regarding the fund col- 
lected by our Order for the arming of this de- 
fensive force. I assure those who contributed 
that all moneys will be devoted to the purpose 
originally announced. The present attitude of 
Mr. Redmond and some of his colleagues is an 
innovation in the long struggle for Irish national- 
ity for which I was not prepared — an innovation, 
too, which I cannot endorse. I do not believe 

[265] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

that the flower of Ireland's youth should be sac- 
rificed in England's fight for European suprem- 
acy. England's treatment of Ireland forbids any 
such enthusiastic co-operation on the part of Ire- 
land's sons. The spectacle of once-trusted lead- 
ers acting as recruiting sergeants for the British 
army cannot be viewed with any friendliness 
whatever by the Hibernians of America, and 
means will, therefore, be taken to prevent these 
misguided leaders from securing possession of 
the funds contributed by our Order. These funds 
must not be used for any movement not designed 
to strengthen Ireland — and Ireland alone." 

Mr. Redmond's official organization in this 
country is the United Irish League, which, with 
Home Rule as its platform, was popular and pros- 
perous. The writer was a member of it, but re- 
signed on learning, when in Ireland, that Mr. 
Redmond was getting ready to use its powerful 
machinery and money in the recruiting work for 
the British army. The president of the United 
Irish League is Michael J. Ryan of Philadelphia, 
corporation counsel of the city, a worthy and able 
man, a fine lawyer, who made a phenomenal run 
for Governor of Pennsylvania. The League has 
done good work for Ireland, and Mr. Ryan is 

[266] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

placed in a hard position. He has confined his 
criticism to the history of Germany and England. 
In an eloquent speech, delivered in the Academy 
of Music, Philadelphia, Mr. Ryan defended Ger- 
many, attacked England, and showed how the 
German nation was being slandered and villified. 
No public meetings of the United Irish League 
have been held or money subscribed and paid 
since the outbreak of the war. Mr. Redmond 
appears not to have consulted his supporters in 
America or shown compunction in the destruc- 
tion of the League. He must have known that no 
considerable body of Irish-Americans could con- 
tinue an organization which was used for war 
purposes against the Germans and still hope to 
live on terms of amity with Germans as neigh- 
bors. He should have known that Germany is a 
long-time loyal friend of the United States, while 
England is the hereditary foe of this country, as 
every school boy is taught by the wars of 1776 
and 1812, her interference in the Civil War in 
1861, and the nearness to war with her in 1893 
over Venezuela, when President Cleveland de- 
nounced her. Americans, who have studied his- 
tory, know that England took advantage of the 
Civil War to eliminate our merchant marine, and 

[267] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

America is suffering greatly to-day for want of 
American-made ships or ships flying the Ameri- 
can flag. 

THE IRISH-AMERICAN PRESS 

All of the leading and influential papers in 
America are now against Redmond. The Irish 
World of New York, the oldest journal of its 
kind in the world, which reaches every town, is 
conducting a brilliant campaign against his pol- 
icy. As the Irish World has been his most pow- 
erful supporter, the change is significant. It has 
suspended collecting funds for Ireland after forty 
years of marvellous success. 

A powerful and ably edited journal is the Gaelic- 
American of New York. Those of us who have 
been foolish enough to fancy that Redmond 
might live to be another Emmet, are forced to 
speak reverently now of a misunderstood veteran, 
who has suffered much criticism and misrepre- 
sentation by the majority of his countrymen. 

Redmond has acted exactly as the discerning 
editor of the Gaelic-American said he would, in 
the event of a crisis, and as we said he wouldn't. 

T. P. O'Connor, M.P., in his "History of Par- 
nell," gives the credit for founding the Irish 

[268] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

national movement in America to the editor of 
the Gaelic-American. This journal has raised a 
fund of some $31,000 in a few weeks, which you 
may be sure Redmond will not secure. 

The Irish Standard of Minneapolis, the Leader 
of San Francisco, Union and Times of Buffalo, 
Hibernian of Boston, Chronicle of Albany, Inde- 
pendent of Butte, Light of Scranton, Sun of 
Syracuse, which are undoubtedly the influential 
newspapers in their localities, making a specialty 
of Irish news, are solidly opposed to Redmond's 
leading the peasants of Ireland to slaughter fields. 

The societies in America which contributed 
$400,000 to preserve the Irish language have 
unanimously condemned John Redmond. And it 
may be remarked here that the only college pro- 
fessors in the world, outside of Ireland and Amer- 
ica, who have studied the ancient Irish tongue, 
are professors at Bonn and Heidelburg, in Ger- 
many. The culture of Germany has long em- 
braced the Irish language and helped to save it 
from the fate of the dead languages. One of 
our societies, not long since, sent $50,000 to 
Washington to establish the Gaelic chair in the 
National University. That society repudiated the 
recruiting of the Irish against Germany. The 

[269J 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

united Irish societies of New York, Chicago, and 
many other cities have held vast meetings, where 
the cheers of an aroused people have sounded like 
the rattle of musketry, and the reverberations of 
these gatherings have reached even press- 
censored Ireland. 

Irish observers, scattered over the globe, have 
long noticed that the advance of German com- 
merce and the superior efficiency and thorough- 
ness of the Germans has clearly roused the hate 
and jealousy of Britain, whose title of mistress of 
the seas is threatened. 



[270] 




CHARLES STEWART PARNELL 

"Ireland a nation — free and independent — is the hope and 
the dream of her children scattered over the globe." 



CHAPTER XXV 

A WORD FOR AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

Aside from the evidently false despatches dated 
Petrograd and London, we are unable to secure 
authentic information as to the state of the dual 
monarchy. The leading Catholic review in the 
United States, America, in its issue of January 
9, 1915, says: 

VITALITY OF AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

Few Americans, from the perusal of their daily 
press, can reaize the great vitality which has been dis- 
played by the Dual Monarchy in the present struggle. 

The enormous war loan raised by it was mainly the 
voluntary contribution of the class of people whose 
hard-earned savings were the result of personal labor 
or of modest business and agricultural undertakings. 
Such a circumstance demonstrates the strength of that 
national spirit which had long been obscured by the 
pettiness of party politics. It likewise proves that eco- 
nomically the country was far more sound than even 
its best friends had believed. The Kolnische Volks- 
zeitung admits that, considering the great difference 
in commerce and industry between the two countries, 
Austria-Hungary can compare favorably in her gener- 
osity with Germany herself. Unwillingness to make 

[271] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

signal sacrifices is ascribed only to the great capital- 
ists of the country, whose offerings have, in propor- 
tion, fallen far short of those made by the middle 
classes. It has become evident, from the successive 
revelations brought about by this war, that little was 
understood by the world at large of the real spirit of 
the people, their love of country and their loyalty, 
which has in a moment of national peril united all the 
various races into one strong nation. Remarkable, 
too, have been the financial offerings made for proper 
hospital service and other smiliar needs of the country 
by the Catholic episcopate. To this must be added 
the fact that every Austrian Catholic regards the war 
against Russia as in reality a crusade carried on for 
the Catholic Church to preserve Europe from Russian 
orthodoxy. 

American opinion, which was profoundly ig- 
norant of the case for Austria-Hungary, has 
been greatly modified by the publication of Mr. 
Ludwig's book "Austria-Hungary and the War." 
The New York Times has just given a long no- 
tice to this very informing work, in which the 
writer's fairness is admitted. Americans now 
know that Servia was a mere outpost of Russia, 
and that the Servian propaganda, which would 
have wrecked the dual monarchy, was backed by 
Russian influence and Russian money. The 

[272] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

Hapsburg Empire is in no danger of collapsing 
through financial disorder. "The people can 
look with confidence upon the economic fitness of 
the country to conduct this war," says Dr. Ru- 
dolph Sieghart, president of the strongest finan- 
cial institute in the empire. "Austria-Hungary's 
national wealth is prepared to meet all and 
every vicissitude that this war may bring. What 
was weak and unstable has fallen ofif long since 
on account of the repeated crises connected with 
the Balkan wars. What was left is the power- 
ful stock, and this stock is healthy and able to 
weather all storms." Moreover, according to 
Mr. Ludwig's first-hand reports, important fac- 
tories are running night and day turning out sup- 
plies for the troops, while many other factories 
which manufacture necessities of life are also 
busy. Coal mines are producing from 70 to 80 
per cent, of the normal output. The iron indus- 
try maintains about 75 per cent, of its normal 
business. "War credit banks" have been estab- 
lished to keep smaller businesses supplied with 
credit, and public works in Vienna have been 
continued as in normal times. It is very re- 
markable that the savings banks show an increase 
in deposits over the corresponding period last 

[273] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

year. Schools are going on as usual in Vienna 
and the theatres are kept open. The writer of 
"Austria-Hungary and the War" makes no 
brag, and all who have observed Austrian- 
Hungarian unity and power of resistance must 
agree with his modest claim that the venerable 
empire he represents **has stood the test very 
well." The test has revealed more than political 
unity and economic stability: it has shown the 
extraordinary regard the diverse populations of 
the Hapsburg Empire have for the administra- 
tion. This is natural, as we can perceive when 
we examine the condition of the Poles, for in- 
stance, under Austrian Government. Even if the 
present Home Rule Bill were put into operation, 
if it conferred ten times as many powers on the 
people of Ireland than it confers at present, the 
Irish would not have as much liberty or as much 
power for development as Austrian Poland has 
enjoyed for generations. 



[274] 



CHAPTER XXVI 

CONCLUSION 

The American Eagle is screaming with wrath 
as it becomes plain that England dominates the 
high seas and directs where American ships shall 
pause or move. The British Admiralty controls 
the waters of three-fourths of the world. The 
British Government ordains what shall or shall 
not be carried of American products in American 
bottoms. It is February, 1915 ; the war has lasted 
six months. The irritation in this country against 
England grows apace. Having the power on the 
ocean, her disregard of the rights of neutrals is 
keeping the United States poor. 

Marvellous indeed is the reaction of American 
public sentiment within six months. Hands are 
across the sea, but they are now stretched forth 
to the invincible Germans and their Austrian 
allies. The change is noted among different 
classes and even in high circles. Public senti- 
ment in America is steadily drifting and the drift 
is altogether against England. The moving pic- 
ture men in New York and Chicago note the de- 

[275] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

cline in the earlier enthusiasm of the audiences 
for the Allies. Policemen who have been watch- 
ing the crowds that surround the war bulletin 
boards have informed the writer that a clear 
majority of the watchers are not in sympathy with 
England. There are few calls for the erstwhile 
popular song, " 'Tis a long way to Tipperary.' " 
The German bazaar in the Seventy-first Regiment 
Armory, New York, in two weeks cleared 
$325,000, while the Prince of Wales Relief Fund, 
on the American side, is proving a complete fail- 
ure. The circulation of the new journal The 
Fatherland has increased, in three months, from 
30,000 to 120,000. The morning and evening 
Staats-Zeitimg have doubled their sales. There 
is a notable increase in the receipts of the Irish- 
American journals. And the journals written in 
English which treat the German side fairly find 
some consolation in the improvement of their 
circulation and advertising receipts. Not an 
Irish-American newspaper has been found to 
print the war letters of T. P. O'Connor, M.P., 
long a favorite with this class of readers. Nu- 
merous college professors have come out and, en- 
couraged by numbers, are now engaged in defend- 
ing Germany. The Teutonic publicists are in 

[276] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

great demand from ocean to ocean. Our Irish 
guests who oppose Redmond continue to receive 
a warm welcome. 

There remains not the least question that in 
the second month of the year 1915 a clear ma- 
jority of the American people, quietly or openly, 
favors Germany against England, while feeling 
profoundly sorry for the state of Belgium and 
France. 

The reasons for this extraordinary but certain 
change in American public sentiment is due to 
the following principal reasons: 

1. The discoveries that England poisoned the 
German news wells. 

2. The proof that the stories of German atroci- 
ties are false. 

3. The feeling that England caused "hard 
times" by bottling up our commerce. 

4. The evidence that the attempt to starve Ger- 
many, which failed, starves the United States. 

5. Pride in the American flag and national sor- 
row over its humiliation on the ocean. 

6. The degrading spectacle of British warships 
guarding and watching the entrance to American 
harbors. 

7. The popular belief that the products of 

[277] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

American farms and factory should be held as 
sacred on the sea as on land. 

8. That God owns the ocean — not England. 

9. Admiration on the part of Americans for 
pluck, courage and skill ; they feel Germany is the 
underdog, fighting against heavy odds. 

10. Faith and confidence in the solid virtues 
and patriotism of our neighbors of German blood. 

In addition, the growing belief in the United 
States is that Germany-Austria is steadily and 
surely winning the war. The disastrous defeats 
of the Russians at Tannenburg and on the Vis- 
tula, where they lost 80,000 prisoners alone to 
the Germans, and the rapidity and sureness with 
which the German armies drove the Russians out 
of Poland, their approach to Warsaw, and their 
wonderful support of the Austrians, render it 
certain that Russia not only will be utterly un- 
able to reach Berlin, but cannot hope to succeed in 
an invasion of Germany. The further Russia gets 
away from her base of supplies the less her chances 
of success. In railway communications and com- 
missaries' supplies the Russians are inferior 
and unable to cope with the matchless Germans 
in these essentials of succesful warfare. It was 
Napoleon who said an army travels on its belly. 

[278] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

The superior preparations, skill and efficiency of 
the Germans offset the vast hordes of Russians ; 
brains, not numbers, will win. And the Turkish 
menace in the South creates a diversion of troops 
and war munitions for the benefit of Germany. 
The commerce of Russia is paralyzed by the 
closing of the Baltic Sea by Germany and the 
control of the Dardanelles (the entrance to the 
Black Sea) by Turkey. 

The American public appreciates that the war 
dispatches dated Petrograd are mostly inventions 
or gross exaggerations and sent out to bolster up 
the cause of the Allies. Again and again the 
communications dated Paris have been found to 
contain false news of victories and to give scarcely 
any reference to the failure of the French armies 
to make any notable advance in three months. 
The victory of the German army at the battle 
of Soissons is an exploit worthy to be compared 
in military importance with the battle of Fair 
Oaks in the American Civil War. London has 
belittled the magnitude of this great achievement 
of General Von Kluck and his seasoned troops led 
by the Bavarians. The news, direct from Lon- 
don, is as unreliable as that reported daily from 
Petrograd and Paris, as numerous confirmed 

[279] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

events have shown. The United States military 
experts state, privately of course, that the French 
forces sustained a fearful reverse at Soissons and 
that the tide of fortune has plainly been turning 
against the Allies both in the eastern and western 
theaters of war. 

Contrasted with the inventions of London, 
Paris and Petrograd, the Berlin military and 
naval dispatches are models of brevity, clearness 
and modesty. The German authorities never re- 
port a victory or an advance until they are abso- 
lutely sure they have won one. The indications 
are that Germany holds at least three prisoners 
for every one captured by the Allies. Should this 
average be maintained for a considerable time, 
there would be little doubt that the successful ter- 
mination of the war will be with Germany- 
Austria. 

When Lord Kitchener brings up his million raw 
recruits they will be confronted by seasoned vet- 
erans of a hundred battlefields and a soldiery who 
have slept all winter in trenches. Napoleon 
Bonaparte said that he preferred one regiment of 
troops who had passed a winter in the field to 
three regiments of inexperienced conscripts. 

Observing Americans are contrasting the soli- 
[280] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

darity, harmony and common purpose of the 
people of Germany with the divided counsels, re- 
bellions and mutinies which are observed in the 
British Empire. All Germans, whether in Ger- 
many or America, believe firmly in the justice of 
the German cause. In England several of the 
leading members of the Cabinet resigned rather 
than endorse England's unjust declaration of 
war on Germany. The most long-standing friend 
of the United States in English public life is 
John Morley, the biographer of Gladstone. He 
withdrew from the British Government along 
with Secretary Trevelyan and John Burns, the 
labor member from Battersea, London, who re- 
signed as Minister of Public Works, giving up a 
salary of $25,000 per annum. Notable protests 
were made by Keir Hardie, Ramsay McDonald 
and Lawrence Guinnell, of County Cork, Ireland, 
members of the British Parliament. The sup- 
pression of meetings and newspapers continues in 
Ireland. The country, as has been said, is really 
in a state of martial law. Vessels are inspected 
carefully in all Irish ports lest they may be found 
running rifles and machine guns. Death is a 
solemn and terrible event everywhere, but no 
people take such interest in the funerals of their 

[ 281 J 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

dead as the Irish. Their dead lie on the battle- 
fields, and the mothers cannot see their children 
in their coffins. They are not to be buried in 
the consecrated ground of Ireland. The shibbo- 
leth of Home Rule after the war has an empty 
sound for broken-hearted mothers. The letters 
from Michael, Patrick, Malachi or Dennis in the 
trenches or hospitals are sad reading. The Irish 
have no heart for this war of aggression, in the 
creation of which they had no part, so that many 
of them feel like mercenaries. The Germans are 
buoyed up by the constant thought that if they 
must perish, they die in a war of defense and to 
save the Fatherland. 

There are seditions in Egypt that make the 
British hold on the Suez Canal insecure. In 
South Africa the rebellious Boers have united 
with the Germans and for four months have been 
able to hold the field. Private letters from India 
show that the British troops in that land will be 
required to crush various insurrections, and there 
is little likelihood of a very large number of 
Indian troops being sent to the continent. Re- 
cruiting in Canada among the Irish Nationalists 
is a complete failure. Letters from officers of 
the principal Irish societies contain the interesting 

[ 282 ] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

information that scarcely 500 Irish Nationalists 
have enlisted from that country. Similar reports 
are now being verified and accepted as true from 
Australia, Tasmania and New Zealand. There 
is an insurrection in Morocco that has put the 
French Empire in North Africa into grave peril. 

All in all, the British Empire and her French 
and Russian allies are having many troubles the 
effects of which is gradually impressing Ameri- 
cans. Advices from Italy as late as February, 
1915, show that public sentiment is favorable to 
Germany, and there is no likelihood of Italy being 
drawn into the conflict to fight on the side of the 
Allies. If British diplomacy should prevail on 
Roumania to espouse their cause, that country 
will be offset by Bulgaria, which is ready to strike. 
Persia has been delivered to Russia by England 
and has revolted: 

The London Leader says : 

Britain is now supposed to be the champion of small 
peoples, yet we have the example of Persia before 
our eyes to-day. Persia, whose independence was 
guaranteed by Britain and who has been swallowed by 
Russia! The neutrality and independence of Korea 
was guaranteed by Britain, France and Russia, but 
Korea was seized by Japan and her Queen murdered 
by Japanese agents. Morocco was divided between 

[283] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

France and Spain with the connivance of Britain. 
Britain, like every other nation, breaks her treaties 
when convenient to herself. 

Russia is facing a revolution in Finland, there 
is widespread* disaffection in Russian Poland, re- 
volts are under way in the Mohammedan pos- 
sessions of the Russian Empire, in Bokhara, 
Turkestan and Chiva. The oppressed Jews are 
opposed to the war. The most sanguinary battles 
of the war are being fought in territory that has 
large Jewish population, so the world may see 
the extermination of most of the Jewish race in 
Eastern Europe, where the majority of those un- 
fortunate people live. A movement has been 
started in Afghanistan, to whose borders Russia 
is diverting troops, while the Turks have an army 
of 600,000 men assailing Russia in Trans-Cau- 
casia. While the Allies are numerically superior, 
they are confronted with numerous internal and 
racial troubles, which have increased the obstacles 
to their progress in both the eastern and western 
theatres of war. These serious diversions at the 
end of the first act of the world's tragedy have 
been hidden from Ireland, but the news is grad- 
ually percolating through. The news has greatly 
interfered with the recruiting in Ireland, where 

[284] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

conscription is threatened. Many young men, 
fearing a forced draft into the army, are leaving 
the country. 

FINALE 

Freedom for Ireland — an Irish Republic — is by 
no means an idle or wild dream should the war 
terminate in favor of Germany. Then the dis- 
tribution of power in Europe, Asia and Africa 
would be rearranged. The maps of the world 
have been changed by the outcome of wars. The 
opportunity for the creation of the present United 
States of America presented itself when England 
was exhausted by a long war with France. The 
British Empire, like the Roman Empire, Car- 
thage and all world-wide dominions must perish 
in the fulness and mutability of time. The old 
myth of British supremacy passes away with the 
defeat of England, overpopulated, and with vast 
numbers of her ill-fed families living in single 
rooms in crowded cities. Liberty for Ireland can 
only be won through the triumphs of Germany- 
Austria. Then and then only will the Republic 
of Ireland be a glorious reality and the flag of 
green and gold wave on the seas and over the 
Emerald Isle. 

God bless Germany! God save Ireland! 
[285] 



POSTSCRIPT 



SWAN SONGS OF SUPPRESSED IRISH 
NATIONALIST NEWSPAPERS 

The following important articles appeared in the 
last issues of the suppressed papers Sinn Fein, The 
Irish Volunteer, and The Irish Worker. In each 
case they are editorials. They were written by men 
who had the menace of suppression before them, and 
who, for that reason, are anxious to give a complete 
expression to their view of the situation. The three 
writers are amongst the most able and the most re- 
sponsible men in Ireland. They are: 

Arthur Griffiths, editor of Sinn Fein and its 
predecessor, The United Irishman. He has 
the reputation of being the most forcible and 
the best informed writer on the Irish Press. 
Professor Eoin MacNeill, Professor of Early 
Irish History in the National University of 
Ireland and Vice-President of the Gaelic 
League. It was owing to his initiative that the 
Irish Volunteers were first started. 
James Connolly, the well-known Labor Leader. 
He is the writer of a remarkable study in 
Irish History "Labor in Irish History." 
The first article appeared in the last issue of Sinn 
Fein, the second in the last issue of The Irish Volun- 
teer, and the third in the last issue of The Irish 
Worker. 

[289] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

THE "siNN FEIN" ARTICLE 

Even the Solicitors' Apprentices' Debating Society 
has been pressed into the service of the recruiting 
agents. Last week it opened for the session, with an 
auditorial address on "The Neutrality of Belgium," 
an appropriate subject enough when we have resigned 
ourselves to the creed that the proper topics for dis- 
cussion among young men in Ireland are extraneous 
to Ireland. But the traditional practice of inviting 
speakers of diverse views on the Auditor's thesis was 
departed from, and the platform was as thoroughly 
packed as if Sergeant MacSweeney superintended the 
operation. The speakers were all carefully chosen be- 
cause they could be trusted to say the right thing for 
the crimps, viz., that England was at war because the 
neutrality of Belgium had been violated. 

WHY ENGLAND IS AT WAR 

Now England is not at war because the neutrality 
of Belgium has been violated. She is at war to destroy 
Germany in pursuance of her invariable and avowed 
Continental policy — dating from the days of Elizabeth, 
carried to its first success by Cromwell, and to its ulti- 
mate victory by Pitt — that no Power on the Continent 
shall be permitted to become predominant, and that 
when any Power threatens to do so England must 
form a combination of other Powers to crush it. The 
combination of Europe against Louis XIV, and 
against Napoleon are the classic examples of this 
policy. The combination of France, Turkey, and Sar- 
dinia against Russia in 1854 was its last illustration 

[290] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

until the present war. But in every war of England's 
with this object she advertises another reason as the 
cause of a war. She fought Louis XIV and Napoleon 
on the same pretexts of freedom and altruism she 
puts forward to-day. 

THE MISSION OF KING EDWARD VII 
England has followed exactly the same method in 
the case of Kaiser Wilhelm she followed in the case 
of Napoleon. She has ringed his country round with 
enemies. In 1907 we pointed out in Sinn Fein that 
the "mission" of King Edward, "the Peacemaker," 
accompanied by Sir Edward Grey, through Europe 
was not to make peace, but to create a general Con- 
tinental alliance against Germany. Whether we were 
right when we said the mission was one of war while 
all the remainder of the Press both here and in Great 
Britain pretended or really believed the mission of the 
two Edwards to be one of peace can now be decided. 
France fell easily, despite the fact that the Nation- 
alist French papers opposed the Entente, and pointed 
out what was the truth, that England designed to use 
France as a pawn in her game. 

Russia saw her opportunity and seized it. Before 
she came in she exacted a price from England, which 
England reluctantly paid — the chief part of that price 
was Persia — a country England was bound by her 
honor to protect. Her honor! Persia was dissected 
alive, that Russia might aid England against Germany. 

THE CONGO ATROCITIES AGITATION 

An attempt was made to drag Japan, Belgium and 
[291] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

the United States into the world-alhance. Japan came 
in to play her own hand in the Pacific. Belgium, un- 
der King Leopold, wavered. Then an agitation was 
started in England — inspired by the government — 
against Belgium — the Congo Atrocities agitation. 
King Leopold, by no means a reputable person in 
private life, but at least as reputable as the then King 
of England, was painted a monster of lust and cruelty, 
and suggestions were thrown out that the Belgians 
owed it to civilization and humanity — it is always 
civilization that stirs the heart of England when she 
prepares for war against a rival — to force the dis- 
graceful Leopold to abdicate. His successor, an in- 
finitely better man in private life, had little of Leo- 
pold's ability, and practically none of his knowledge 
of English statecraft. As far back as 19 12 we indi- 
cated in Sinn Fein that Belgium was in the toils of 
England. She had collared King Albert, and per- 
suaded him that his country's future lay with herself 
and France. 

THE FRUSTRATED ANGLO-AMERICAN ALLIANCE 

The effort to secure the United States was sustained 
and vigorous. The programme was to arrange an en- 
tente, which could be forced, as in the case of France, 
into an alliance. The Irish-Americans were the great 
obstacle in the way. Home Rule was tried as the bait 
to neutralize their hostility. Mr. James Bryce, who 
' had been Chief Secretary for Ireland, was sent to 
America for the express purpose of neutralizing if he 
could not gain over the Irish. He had the influence 

[292 ] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

^' 
of Messrs. Dillon, T. P. O'Connor, and Redmond be- 
hind him. He was beaten — hopelessly beaten — by an 
anti-Anglo-American alliance entente between the 
Germans and Irish-Americans. That is the sole rea- 
son why the United States has escaped being dragged 
into the war. 

THE TURKISH REVOLUTIONS 
In Turkey England made efforts second only to her 
efforts in the United States, and the revolution and 
counter-revolution which for a few years convulsed 
that country were due to her attempt to acquire a mas- 
tery over the policy of the Porte. In this case, Ger- 
many totally defeated her, owing largely to the fact 
that the strongest personality in Turkey — Enver Bey 
— knew both England and Germany thoroughly, and 
utterly distrusted the former, while he admired the 
latter. The war against Turkey in the Balkans was 
then promoted, but its developments utterly upset 
British calculations. The end saw Turkey firmly at- 
tached to Germany, while Bulgaria, on whom England 
had always reckoned, became, to an extent, anti- 
British. 

THE DETACHMENT OF ITALY 
Toward Italy and Austria the policy of England 
was to detach them from their ally. In the case of 
Austria, there was never any hope in English state- 
craft to range her among Germany's foes, but there 
was a real hope of keeping her away from Germany's 
side. Here Russian and English diplomacy clashed. 
Russia wanted Austria in the war, as her designs are 

[293] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

far more upon the territory of that empire than upon 
German. A war against Germany, with Austria out, 
would have kept Russia and her cat's-paws out of the 
Adriatic and TEgean — that is, the Mediterranean — and 
left a Great Power on her flank, which Russia knew 
England would utilize when the day of the Anglo- 
Russian struggle came. It was with Austria, therefore, 
Russia was determined to be primarily at war, and 
England yielded the point. In the case of Italy, Eng- 
lish influence and the national character made her pol- 
icy easily successful. Italy had been preserved from at- 
tack, and given thirty years of peace in which to de- 
velop herself by her alliance with Austria and Ger- 
many. When the time came to pay her debt, she re- 
pudiated it. She was the partner of the Triple Alliance 
who gained everything by the alliance. When the 
time came for her to act her part, she discovered that 
Austria, with whom she had allied herself for 
thirty years, was extremely unpopular with her peo- 
ple. Here England had triumphed. The Triple Al- 
liance was deserted by the partner who it had relied 
upon in the Mediterranean, and Germany and Austria 
were left to face alone a military and naval combina- 
tion apparently invincible and irresistible. 



HOW ENGLAND S WORLD-WIDE PRESS AGENCY 
WORKS 

A pretext — a pretext which represented England as 
fighting the battle of the oppressed against the oppress- 

[294] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

or — was necessary, as it is always desirable for Eng- 
land in her wars. To defame those with whom she is 
engaged in war in order to prevent any possibility of 
sympathy in neutral nations, which might develop into 
armed intervention, is a cardinal point of English war- 
policy. Thus when she designed her attack upon the 
Transvaal Republic, which owing to its mineral riches 
had become commercially and politically stronger in 
South Africa than the English colonies of the Cape. 
Natal and Rhodesia, and therefore must be destroyed, 
she began with an agitation against the oppression of 
the uitlanders, or foreign residents. The fact that 
there was no oppression of the uitlanders made no 
difference. The present writer was an uitlander in 
the Transvaal at the time, and neither experienced nor 
even heard of any uitlander who had experienced op- 
pression, but England had a press and a press agency 
with which she could speak every hour to the remotest 
corners of the world. The Boers had a press whose 
voice, like the voice of Ireland, was too feeble to be 
heard outside the confines of the Boer territory. When 
she had invested herself with the desired appear- 
ance of rescuing the oppressed from the oppressor, 
she fell upon the little republic, declaring publicly to 
Europe by the mouth of her Prime Minister, Lord 
Salisbury, that "she sought no gold-fields and sought 
no territory," and ravaged the Transvaal and its gal- 
lant little ally, the Free State, with fire and sword, 
seizing the gold-fields and the territory she had pledged 
herself not to seek. 

[295] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

SERVIA AND BELGIUM 

Obviously a pretext of defending the oppressor 
from the oppressed could not be found in the case of 
Servia — a country whose throne was reared on the 
most cowardly regicide in modern history and whose 
government, as every politician in Europe knows, has 
operated by private assassination against its oppo- 
nents. The murder of the heir to the Crown of the 
Austro-Hungarian Empire was the culmination of the 
Servian policy of assassination, and if Austro-Hun- 
gary had failed to put it beyond the power of Servia 
to continue her dastardly campaign, she would have 
ceased to exist as a Power. The pretext of "Little 
Servia" would have deceived no nation — for every 
nation in Europe knows what Servian methods are. 
But some pretext of weakness oppressed by strength 
had to be found, and England found it in the case of 
Belgium — poor little Belgium, whose neutrality had 
been violated. Belgium and Holland are little states 
whose neutrality the Great Powers were supposed to 
respect. Obviously, such states must rely upon the 
good faith of these Powers, and leave their frontiers 
unguarded, or else they must guard them impartially. 
Holland has done this. She has fortified her country 
indifferently against attack from any of her neigh- 
bors. Belgium did not do so. She fortified her Ger- 
man frontiers, and left her French frontier unfortified, 
and her English frontier — the sea — exposed, except 
at Antwerp, to anything the British fleet might care to 
attempt upon it. 

[296] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

We shall leave out of consideration this fact and 
the portfolio "Intervention Anglais-Belgique," which 
was found in the archives of the Belgian General Staff, 
dating back as far as 1906, and examine from her own 
admitted official documents England's claim that she 
entered this war on Belgium's behalf. England has 
officially published her case under the title of "Great 
Britain and the European Crisis." In passing, our 
Irish Imperialists may note that, although the official 
description of this kingdom is Great Britain and Ire- 
land, the name of Ireland is dropped out of the official 
document published by the Foreign Office. 

STORY OF CROOKED BRITISH DIPLOMACY 

On July 30th Sir Edward Grey wrote declining 
neutrality on the basis of Germany respecting French 
territory as distinct from French colonies. Belgium 
was mentioned in this dispatch, but as a minor con- 
sideration. The following day (dispatch No. iii) 
Sir Edward Grey telegraphed to the British Ambas- 
sador in Berlin that, if France became involved, Eng- 
land would be drawn in, so he (Sir Edward Grey) 
had informed the German Ambassador in London. 
Belgium was not even alluded to by the British For- 
eign Minister. On the same day, however, he ad- 
dressed to the French and German governments, 
through their Ambassadors, a formal inquiry as to 
whether they would respect the neutrality of Belgium, 
so long as no other Power violated it. At the same 
time, he telegraphed to the British Minister at Brus- 

[ 297 1 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

sels to inform the Belgian Government of his inquiry 
to France and Germany, and to say, "I assume that 
the Belgian Government will maintain to the utmost 
of their power this neutrality," and that "an early 
reply is desired." Observe that these three latter tele- 
grams were sent out after Sir Edward Grey had in- 
formed the German Ambassador that if, not Belgium, 
but France, were involved, England would be drawn 
in. Why had he not raised the question of Belgium's 
neutrality then, on which England now professes to 
have gone to war? 

THE GERMAN OFFER 

On the following day, August ist, the German Am- 
bassador in London inquired (dispatch 123) whether, 
if Germany pledged herself not to violate Belgian 
neutrality, England would engage to remain neutral. 
England's Foreign Minister declined to give that en- 
gagement. "I did not think," he writes, "that we 
could give a promise of neutrality on that condition 
alone." 

Thus while we have England pretending to-day 
through her press, her platform, her pulpit, and her 
Parliament that she went into the war to preserve the 
neutrality of Belgium, we have here the evidence of 
her own officially published dispatches, refusing to 
guarantee Germany that she would remain neutral, if 
Germany guaranteed to respect Belgian neutrality ; and, 
while she was rejecting the proposal of Germany to 
leave Belgium out of it, her Minister at Brussels was, 

[298] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

on the instructions of the British Government (dis- 
patch 115), urging Belgium to uphold her neutrality 
"to the utmost of its power," i. e., by opposing armed 
force to Germany. 

Read side by side, what a story these dispatches re- 
veal. Belgium ignored in the discussion between the 
German Ambassador and the British Foreign Minister 
on the morning of July 31st. Belgium is telegraphed 
to in the evening by the British Government to "up- 
hold its neutrality to the utmost of its power." Ger- 
many refused the next day a pledge from England 
that she will be neutral if Belgian neutrality is re- 
spected — refused even an engagement though Ger- 
many suggests that in addition to respecting Belgian 
neutrality, French territorial integrity both at home 
and abroad will be respected. "If you," says England 
in effect to Germany, "if you guarantee not to attack 
France through Belgium, not to use your fleet against 
the French Northern coast, not to impair French in- 
tegrity, not to seize French colonies, why then we will 
do what we consider best for ourselves. You must 
give us guarantees — we will give you no promise, 
must keep our hands free" (dispatch 123). 

BELGIAN NEUTRALITY "noT A DECISIVE FACTOR" 

The tragi-comedy was really played out in forty- 
eight hours. On the day that Belgium was exhorted to 
assert herself against Germany by force of arms, the 
French Ambassador was informed by Sir Edward 
Grey that the preservation of Belgian neutrality might 

[299] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

be an important factor, but not a decisive factor, in 
determining England's attitude. This was in the same 
interview in which Sir Edward Grey thrice dechned 
M. Cambon's appeal definitely to inform Germany that 
England would side with France if hostilities broke 
out, an assurance which M. Cambon declared would 
avert war. England kept, as Sir Edward Grey 
boasted, "her hands free" until war had broken out be- 
tween Russia and France with Germany and until 
Belgium, relying upon English aid that never came, 
entered the war. Then when they were all in — when 
it seemed that England had only to throw in her 
weight to crush Germany — then England entered the 
war. And then it was she entered it on a pretext, 
which we have shown from her own state papers to be 
false — the preservation of Belgian neutrality — that 
neutrality she told France was not a decisive factor — 
that she told Germany she would not engage herself to 
stand aside even though Germany guaranteed it. 

THE SACRIFICE OF BELGIUM 

Belgium was sacrificed, but not by the Power that 
knocked at its gate, and asked permission to pass 
through, not by the Power that, when Liege had fallen 
to its invincible guns, wrote to the Belgian Govern- 
ment in the hour of victory : "The fortress of Liege 
has been taken by assault after a courageous defence. 
The German Government regrets that such bloody en- 
counters should have occurred. It is only by reason of 
the military measures of France that it has been forced 

[ 300] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

to take the grave determination of entering Belgium 
and the Belgian army has in heroic resistance against 
great superiority maintained the honor of its arms in 
the most prilliant fashion, and the German Government 
prays his Majesty the King and the Belgian Govern- 
ment to avert from Belgium the further horrors of 
war. The German Government is ready for any 
agreement with Belgium. Once more Germany offers 
her solemn assurance that she has not been actuated 
by any intention to appropriate Belgian territory and 
that such intention is far from her." 

Belgium was sacrificed by the Power that urged her 
into armed resistance to the violation of her neutrality, 
while it at the same time was declaring to France that 
Belgian neutrality was not a decisive factor, and de- 
clining the offer of Germany to respect Belgian neu- 
trality if England herself remained neutral. Belgium 
was sacrificed by the Power that impelled her to armed 
resistance in the belief that England and France would 
come to her aid and drive the invader from her soil — 
and that left her to bear the brunt of war unaided for 
three weeks, while the British navy swept German 
commerce from the seas. 

THE MEPHISTOPHELES AMONG NATIONS 

We are sorry for Belgium — the dupe of a diplomacy 
that has made puppets of far stronger and more ex- 
perienced Powers. We have never underestimated 
English statecraft. It is subtle and dextrous beyond 
the statecraft of France and Germany in times of 

[301 ] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

peace. The slow, steady coiling of the web around 
Germany from 1906; the mobilization of the fleet at 
Spithead on pretence of a review days before war was 
dreamed of; the steady forcing of France by ma- 
neuvring of Belgium into war without committing 
England until the anti-German combination had gone 
too far to back out ; and then the setting up of the false 
pretext that she intervened to defend the neutrality of 
Belgium — these things we can admire, while we detest ; 
as we may admire, while we detest, the subtlety of 
Mephistopheles. And as we note the successful un- 
folding of her evil craft we knew what England's first 
act of war would be — to shut off Germany from com- 
munication with the neutral world until she had 
poisoned its ear against Germany by her picture of 
Germany as a wanton tyrant attacking, in breach of 
faith, the integrity and independence of a little coun- 
try, and had won a world-sympathy by depicting her- 
self as the peace-desirous Power roused to war by her 
indignation and her honor. 

We knew the first act of war on England's part 
would be to cut the German cable. And that was what 
England did. Thus for two weeks her powerful press 
and the press of half the world which consciously and 
sub-consciously is under its thrall, echoed her charges 
against Germany and the Germans until half the world 
almost believed that the people, who in government, 
science, industry, and education surpass all other peo- 
ple, and who in art and literature are equal to any 
other, were really savages whose nature and whose 

[ 302 ] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

acts called for their extirpation from this world and 
their eternal punishment in the next. 

WHEN PRO-GERMAN IS A TITLE OF HONOR FOR AN 
IRISHMAN 

Sinn Fein has ever been and ever will be pro- 
Irish and pro-nothing else. While Irishmen have a 
country denied its national, its political, and its eco- 
nomic liberties, no other nation's right or wrongs can 
have claim to their exertions. But if to defend the 
remnant of Irish manhood from being hurried to de- 
struction in this war, planned by England, provoked 
by England, and intended to serve only England ; and 
if to vindicate from the monstrous calumnies that 
Ireland's centuried calumniator and oppressor is pour- 
ing out upon a great nation and a noble people, is 
to be a pro-German, then we accept the title as one 
of honor and worthy of an Irishman to wear. 



THE "IRISH workers" " ARTICLE 

"The Earl of Halsbury said that in deference to the 
wishes of the government he would not press his ob- 
jections, but he thought the proposal of this bill was 
the most unconstitutional thing that had ever hap- 
pened." 

The foregoing sentence is from a report of a debate 
in the House of Lords on the "Defence of the Realm 
Consolidation Act," on Friday, November 27th. This 
precious act gives the military authorities power to ar- 

[303] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

rest civilians and try them by courts-martial, sets 
aside all the ordinary safeguards of civil liberty, and 
empowers these courts-martial to inflict the death pen- 
alty or any lesser sentence. In other words, and 
plainer language, it establishes Martial Law as the law 
of the land, and places the lives and liberties of all in 
the power of a military unaccustomed to the restraints 
of civilized courts or justice, and ignorant of the laws 
of evidence. 

A German, a French, an Italian, or an Austrian 
Government would have openly and honorably sought 
to attain those ends by a declaration of Martial Law ; 
the hypocritical and cowardly gang of assassins who 
control the government of the British Empire seek to 
achieve the same objects by clandestinely and treacher- 
ously destroying civil liberties whilst professing a de- 
sire to safeguard and protect them. This is but a 
fitting culmination to all the anti-democratic and liber- 
ty-hating diplomacy which brought about this war, and 
now seeks to destroy every agency which would help 
to unmask its injurious conspiracy against mankind, 
or tell the truth about the terrors that accompany it. 
As a result of this act there is no longer liberty in Ire- 
land — liberty of speech, liberty of associations, liberty 
of the press, liberty of the subject are all gone. No 
longer may a man or woman demand to be tried by his 
or her peers in an open court room, before their eyes 
and hearing of his or her fellows. At any time any 
man or woman may be arrested, day or night, and 
dragged of¥ in secret, to be tried in secret, and con- 

[304] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

demned and assassinated in secret by the hired assas- 
sins of the British Empire. 

Aye, there is no break in the continuity of the 
methods of British Imperial Rule in Ireland. DubHn 
Castle is always Dublin Castle, the same at all times, 
loathesome, lying, hypocitical, MURDEROUS. 

Of course we have the word of this government 
that no death sentences will be carried out until Par- 
liament meets, and of course we all know what the 
word of the government is worth. Belgium knows it 
now, knows that this government pledged its honor 
to maintain Belgian neutrality, and then manoeuvred 
to leave Belgium irrevocably committed to sink or 
swim with one side in this struggle in which she was 
supposed to remain neutral. Ireland knows it, knows 
that the Liberal Government pledged its word to give 
Home Rule to all Ireland, then pledged its word to 
Carson not to force Home Rule upon all Ireland, 
pledged its words to place a representative of labor 
upon the Commission into the Dublin Police Outrages, 
then deliberately breaks its solemn word, and ap- 
pointed no such representatives; pledged its word to 
appoint an independent Commission of Inquiry into 
the Bachelor's Walk Massacre, and yet declared in 
Parliament beforehand that the said Commission 
would exonerate the uniformed murderers of peace- 
ful citizens. Aye, Ireland knows the value of a gov- 
ernment promise, as our fathers knew it in the past! 

But let "Messieurs, the Assassins," beware. There 
are in Ireland to-day many scores of thousands of 

[305] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

earnest men neither committed to the British Empire 
nor to the cause of revolution. For the most part 
these are men who, wearied of the chaos of Irish 
poHtics, gave a grudging adhesion to the parHamentary 
attempt to secure some form of Home Rule as an 
organized legal expression of Irish nationhood. Loy- 
alty to the party entrusted with that task has kept these 
men silent and inactive even whilst that party was be- 
traying their trust and besmirching their ideals. Al- 
ways the hope persisted that eventually Home Rule 
would come, and then these traitors would be punished 
by an outraged people. But if the British Government 
once more throws off the mask of constitutionalism 
and launches its weapons of repression against those 
who dare to differ with it, if once more it sets in mo- 
tion its jails, its courts-martial, its scaffolds, then the 
last tie that binds those men to the official Home Rule 
gang will snap. On that day we will see once again 
all the best and brightest in Ireland definitely arraying 
itself on the side of revolution, fully realizing that 
freedom and the British Empire cannot co-exist in 
this country. 

The constitutional mask, the simulacrum of civil 
liberty still paralyzes the activities and holds the hand 
of many a true Irish patriot, as the boasted Freedom 
of Contract of the Wage-system still hides from many 
a worker the reality of his slavery. But once let the 
government drop that mask, or abandon that pretence 
of civil liberty, and then the result will see such a res- 
urrection of Irish revolutionary spirit such as has not 
been seen for generations. 

[306] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

A resurrection! Aye, out of the grave of the first 
Irish man or woman murdered for protesting against 
Ireland's participation in this thrice-accursed war there 
will arise anew the Spirit of Irish Revolution. 

"The graves of those murdered for 
Freedom bear seed for Freedom 
Which the winds carry afar and re-sow." 

Yes, my lords and gentlemen, our cards are all on 
the table! If you leave us at hberty we will kill your 
recruiting, save our poor boys from your slaughter- 
house, and blast your hopes of empire. If you strike 
at, imprison, or kill us, out of our prisons or graves 
we will still evoke a spirit that will thwart you, and, 
mayhap, raise a force that will destroy you. 

We defy you ! Do your worst ! 

Whether this death sentence upon Irish prisoners of 
these new courts-martial will or will not be carried 
out will depend, not upon the plighted honor or sol- 
emn assurances of Cabinet Ministers already fore- 
sworn and discredited even in their own country, nor 
yet upon any action of the degenerate Irish members 
of Parliament who sat still and helped to destroy the 
constitutional rights of which they prate so loudly; 
nor yet upon the British Labor members who, like all 
apostates, are readiest to stab and destroy all those 
who remain true to that ideal of democratic freedom 
they have deserted and dishonored. No, the question 
of life and death will depend solely upon the temper 
of the people of Ireland. If they remain dumb, nerve- 

[307] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

less, lacking in intrepidity, quivering too mutely in the 
leash laid upon them by the apostles of "caution and 
restraint," then the blow will fall in increasing severity 
and ferocity, arrest will follow arrest, blow will follow 
blow, and sentences will increase in savagery in exact 
proportion to the tameness of the Irish people, until at 
last the death penalty will once more strike down those 
who embody the rebellious people of the Irish race. 
Oh, it is all well planned. Their fathers in Hell 
could not have planned it better! 



THE IRISH VOLUNTEER ARTICLE 

"Sas a dheanta chuimhuigh air." Those who are 
capable of a sharp curve are capable of any amount 
of sharp curves. It comes easier by practice. Men 
who are not expert in the sharp curve may after all be 
just as "safe hands" as any. Our line is a straight 
line. We mean to go on with organizing, training, 
instructing, and arming, until the whole manhood of 
the Irish nation is no longer at the mercy of the 
plotters of unconstitutional violence at the Carlton 
Club, the Kildare Street Club, or the Curragh Camp. 
We are not in a hurry. We have never promised that 
this year of grace and other things, 1914, would be 
the Home Rule Year. For my own part, long before 
trouble was forced upon us, instead of promising rash 
things, I have told Irish Volunteers and those whom 
I asked to become Irish Volunteers that they had to 
build up from the foundations, and that they ought to 

[308] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

be well satisfied if they succeeded in building some- 
thing solid and invincible within three years, or ten 
years, or even twenty years. The man that cannot 
face whatever length of time is necessary for sure and 
steady constructive work is no man for Ireland, We 
have to plant a hardy tree, not a hothouse ornament 
to be cut down by the first frost. 

The imperial crisis has blotted out the boundaries 
of English parties. Here is an official announcement : 
"Mr. Balfour, Mr. Churchill, the Marquis of Crewe, 
Sir Edward Grey, and Mr. Lloyd George joined the 
Premier at lo Downing Street yesterday (Dec. i6th). 
They constituted themselves a sub-committee of the 
Committee of Imperial Defence. Mr. Churchill left 
the Admiralty, but the other Ministers remained in 
conference. Mr. Balfour, Sir Edward Grey, and the 
Marquis of Crewe, together with a general officer 
from the War Office, left together." Following this, 
we read a statement in the English press to the effect 
that a coalition government is in contemplation; that 
is, a Ministry composed of Liberals and Unionists. 
***** 

The Irish people will be curious to know how their 
interests will be looked after. Mr. Balfour is evi- 
dently recovering his position as real, if not acknowl- 
edged leader of the Unionist Party. More than that, 
the Imperial crisis has given him a position of virtual 
power with the existing administration, and that posi- 
tion may at any time obtain formal and official recog- 

[309] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

nition. The "Sub-Committee of Imperial Defence" is 
no sub-committee. Sub-committees do not announce 
that they have "constituted themselves." This partic- 
ular committee may be able to exercise even greater 
powers than the Cabinet. The London Times, in a 
recent editorial, stated bluntly that Ireland is now un- 
der "martial law." The Cabinet does not administer 
martial law. It looks as if, to all intents and purposes, 
the "Home Rule" government has ceased to exist as 
the real government. 

While party lines are obliterated in England, and 
while the Cabinet has obliterated its own lines of Irish 
policy, one party, the Unionist Party, has not been in- 
duced by the Imperial crisis and the dictates of patriot- 
ism to obliterate one letter or line of its hostility to 
Home Rule and to Irish Nationality in every shape 
and form. On the contrary, every responsible Unionist 
pronouncement with regard to Ireland since the crisis 
began has been as hostile to the Irish national position 
as if there were no war and no crisis. Certain "Na- 
tionalist" organs have been so busy in denouncing 
mere Irishmen, reviling "Sinn Feiners," and demand- 
ing the head of the Gaelic League, that they have none 
of their choice language to spare for the attitude of 
Unionist leaders who are now hand in glove with the 
"Home Rule" Ministry and may shortly be hand in 
hand with them and the glove off. 

What is Mr. Balfour's position? To him, as far as 
we know, the Irish Nationalist is still the Irish Enemy. 

[310] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

He has not receded one inch from his support of the 
policy of unconstitutional violence against Ireland. 
His last great pronouncement on Irish affairs was his 
demand for the "clean cut," the separation of all 
Ulster from Ireland, He has not qualified that de- 
mand. With tears in his voice, he admitted that the 
case against Home Rule for three-fourths of Ireland 
was as good as lost, and his colleagues confessed that 
the decisive factor in that conclusion was the rise of 
the "new complication," the Irish Volunteers. All 
the more eagerly Mr. Balfour demanded the "clean 
cut," the amputation of Ulster, Nationalists and all, 
Patrick's Armagh, Columba's Derry, Down of the 
Three in one Grave, Tyrone of the O'Neills, all Ulster 
of glorious history, from Ireland, in duritatem odii, 
for the perpetuation of hatred and discord. The Im- 
perial crisis has not caused Mr. Balfour's patriotism to 
recant one syllable. 

If it is patriotism for English statesmen to lay 
aside their party differences, and for some of them to 
shelve their most solemn compacts, during an Imperial 
crisis, what are we to say of the patriotism of the 
Freeman's Journal and its adjuncts? We are in the 
greatest crisis of Irish affairs since the Famine, the 
greatest purely political crisis since the Union. In this 
crisis, while the anti-Irish policy in its most aggravated 
form still holds the field unshaken and unrepentant, 
some of our patriots can find no enemy to attack but 
an Irish enemy. The "Sinn Feiners," who take their 

[311] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

stand on an international treaty, the Renunciation Act 
of 1783, and declare the Act of Union to be a viola- 
tion of that treaty, effected by fraud and force, never 
accepted by the Irish nation, and therefore held to be 
null and void in respect of moral obligation — these, 
we are told, and not the unrepentant anti-Irish oli- 
garchy of England, are the enemy. We can remember 
when it was still a point of honour with constitutional 
Nationalists to take the part of the most extreme Na- 
tionalists against British statesmen, and when the 
Freeman, even the Freeman, denounced Mr. As- 
quith. Home Ruler, for "banging the prison door" on 
Irish poHtical "felons." 

In Mr. Redmond's Limerick pronouncement there 
was nothing new. Certain features of previous pro- 
nouncements were absent, notably, if the report I have 
read is adequate, the denunciation with opprobrious 
terms of those who are convinced that his attitude to- 
ward the Volunteers has been unnecessary, unwar- 
ranted, and unfruitful. He said in Limerick — we 
take him as addressing Volunteers — that a certain 
course of conduct was dictated by honor, by justice, 
and by policy. By honor, because of the enactment 
of Home Rule. By justice, because of the sufferings 
of Belgium and the French Cathedrals. By policy, in 
the hope of converting anti-Irish prejudice. 

On the question of honor, I must refer once more 
to the London Times. In an editorial of December 7th, 
the Times, probably bearing in mind a famous say- 

[312] 



THE KING, THE KAISER, AND IRISH FREEDOM 

ing of Daniel O'Connell about its praises, professes to 
be anxious to help Mr. Redmond by encouraging the 
suppression of certain **rags." The Times gives 
the word "rags" as a quotation. The Times says, 
in the course of this article, that Ireland is at present 
under, not Home Rule, but Martial Law, and does not 
even suggest that it looks forward to Ireland coming 
at any time under Home Rule. Is it ordinary com- 
mon sense or "political insanity" to think that the 
obligations of honor will not begin until what the 
Times calls Martial Law, administered by an ex- 
ternal authority, gives place to Home Rule adminis- 
tered by a National authority? We have a check 
signed for Home Rule, or, if we have not got it, it is 
there in the Check Book. Before the check was 
signed and left in the Check Book, the drawers of the 
check openly withdrew from the bank a large part of 
the funds that were to meet the check, and at the 
same time they postdated the check to the year "after 
the war." Are we bound in honor to honor that sort 
of check with prompt payment ? 

H< sic }{: ^ Hi 

It is not only that what the Times calls Martial 
Law is administered instead of Home Rule, govern- 
ment according to Irish ideas, etc. We have the 
authority of the Freeman for stating that the partic- 
ular acts of administration commended by the 
Times are injurious to Mr. Redmond's position, and 
therefore presumably done against his wish. What 
obligations of honor are created by this special brand 
of Home Rule? 

[313] 



"Life is too short for reading inferior books" — ^ryce. 

MY UNKNOWN CHUM 

("AGUECHEEK") 

Foreword by HENRY GARRITY 

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